544 JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. [ December ie, iseo. 
which, to say the least, has been most discouraging and unfortu¬ 
nate. As he remarks at the commencement of his commendable 
confession of failure, “ Asparagus is one of the most important 
vegetables grown in the kitchen garden and therefore the 
comments by different growers, if they do not exactly afford 
the true cause of Mr. Nunns’ failure, may yet prove instructive 
to many readers of this Journal. It seems to me that your corre¬ 
spondent, although he appears to have gone earnestly to work, 
has really killed his plants with kindness. A perusal of his notes 
gives the impression that he hasemployed by far too much manure 
for almost any soil, and especially a “stiff retentive loam.” What 
may prove quite proper for a sandy loam or light soil, with, say, a 
gravelly subsoil, which is naturally drained quickly, may be alto¬ 
gether unsuited for a heavy retentive soil, the subsoil of which is 
generally somewhat in keeping with that on the surface. According 
to your correspondent’s showing the piece of ground selected “ was 
rather wet,” and the probability is that the garden is imperfectly 
drained. Unfortunately be is not so explicit on this point as in 
others. Drained no doubt the garden is, but at what depth ? 
and how far apart are the drains 1 From the fact of the surface 
being rather wet I should surmise that the drains are too deep to 
act properly, as there is no doubt that unbroken shale is almost 
impervious to water. In a plantation here, for instance, I found 
some deep drains quite useless, nothing short of shallow open 
drains being of avail. The subsoil I found comparatively dry 
when taking out a large Conifer, whereas the surface soil had to 
be washed off the spades repeatedly. The hole made by taking 
out the tree was enlarged, surface drains were cut to it, and it has 
ever since been nearly full of water. This, of course, is an excep¬ 
tional case, but I quote it to demonstrate the necessity of having 
shallow drains in some soils. In the same garden in which Aspa¬ 
ragus failed, most vegetables, Strawberries, Peaches and Nectarines, 
Apples and Pears, all succeed well. But the question is, Was the 
ground trenched for them with great quantities of manure worked- 
in to a good depth, causing the roots to extend so far downwards 
as to be destroyed owing to excessive moisture ? which I consider 
the true cause of the Asparagus failure. 
Had I the management of such a garden not much of the shale 
would find its way to the surface, at all events till its character 
had been much changed. Instead of the drains being, as usual, 
1^ rod apart and from 3 to 4 feet in depth, they should be only 
1 rod apart and 2 feet in depth. The drainage pipes should be 
covered with broken bricks, clinkers, or other rough lasting 
material 6 inches in depth, and the shale be broken up to the 
level of this, working in as much refuse as is obtainable, and other 
undecayed material. The top spit of stiff retentive loam I should 
endeavour to improve by digging it up very roughly in the autumn, 
occasionally employing a dressing of quicklime, and as much 
leaf soil and spent tan, cocoa-nut fibre refuse, ashes, decayed 
garden refuse, road trimmings, and anything suitable that could 
be obtained, the aim being to provide a sufficiency of good workable 
soil without trenching deeply. 
To break up and work many kinds of soil, under the impres¬ 
sion that the land is better drained thereby, is a great mistake, as 
in reality the more it is broken up the more sodden it becomes, 
and in which state it will remain for a long time. Rather than 
plant or sow on a great depth of saturated soil, I would much 
prefer having ground freshly dug one spit in depth. Here, for 
instance, we seldom dig for many early crops till a few hours 
prior to planting or sowing, as the case may be, taking care as 
much as possible to select a dry time for the operation, even if we 
wait a few days over the regulation time. Once our soil becomes 
saturated, the greatest difficulty is experienced in having it dry 
to a sufficient depth, especially during the spring months. No 
after labour will compensate for planting when the ground is 
unfit. 
With regard to Asparagus the question is, Does it require 
such elaborate preparations as are usually made for it ? I say, 
Certainly not. If instead] of making deep rich beds—(which in 
Mr. Nunns’ case, were cut out of a hard subsoil, thereby probably 
forming a water basin)—the Asparagus roots were planted on 
the surface of ordinarily roughly-dug well-pulverised soil, the 
results would be equally satisfactory. It would be advisable on 
a heavy soil to use a mixture of light, though not rich, soil above 
and below the roots in order to assist in their establishment. 
Not much manure would be required for at least two seasons, 
though it would be advisable to mulch with half-decayed manure 
at planting time, or before the sun has gained much power. The 
Asparagus, as all must admit, is really shallow-rooting, or as a 
writer in a contemporary put it, “ the roots strike out horizontally 
rather than bore down perpendicularly.” By planting on a some¬ 
what poor soil and given annual top-dressing of manure the roots 
will be retained near the surface, and be more vigorous and healthy 
accordingly. The time of failure with Mr. Nunns appears to be 
when the roots have worked down into the cold subsoil, and are 
there either injured by excessive moisture or by some injurious 
constituent of the soil. In the former case the crowns would be 
badly matured, and therefore more susceptible of injury from 
frost or long-continued dampness, than are those plants with the 
majority of the roots nearer the surface. What strengthens me 
in the opinion of this being the right solution of the cause of 
failure, is the fact of much Asparagus being killed during the last 
severe winter which followed a wet and cold summer. 
My advice, therefore, to Mr. Nunns and others is to adopt the 
more simple style of preparing and planting I have briefly 
detailed, and which is much the same as far as the act of planting 
is concerned as that adopted by the French. Probably they were 
the first to follow this practice ; but it is quite certain that shallow 
planting has long been successfully practised. Larger the French 
undoubtedly grow it; but I question, if all accounts are true, if 
they have more profitable plantations than are those of my friends 
who have single lines of plants between long rows of Gooseberry 
bushes. In the first instance two-year-old plants were simply 
laid on the well-broken-up strip of soil, covered over lightly and 
mulched, and for years they have thrown up good quantities of 
saleable produce. The soil is a deep retentive loam, and all that 
now is done is to liberally'mulch with good manure every autumn. 
What great strain upon the Asparagus plants is there that they 
require such elaborate and expensively made beds 1 —W. Iggulden. 
DECEMBER FLOWERS. 
To supply a large private establishment now-a-days during 
the shooting season with sufficient flowers is no light task, for it 
seems as if nothing can be done without flowers, and their popu¬ 
larity shows no sign of diminishing. Carpet beds and perennial 
borders may grow or decline in favour, bright colours and sombre 
foliage may each have their turn for summer decoration, but he 
who manages to have a large stock of flowers for all purposes 
during the dull winter months never need fear being out of 
fashion. A correspondent at page 504 has mentioned a few good 
plants which flower during the present month, but he by no 
means exhausts the list, and indeed he omits some of the best. I 
shall not attempt to exhaust the list either; for instead of this 
being the dull time of year which many people describe, I take it to 
be the very brightest period as regards indoor flowering plants with 
those who have the convenience to grow them. The plants I 
shall name are all of easy growth, and with one or two exceptions 
are generally well known. 1 will take the exceptions first, the 
most valuable of which is a semi-double Zonal Pelargonium, which 
appeared in the catalogues a few years ago, and, like many hundred 
more, has disappeared again because it had no special merit as an 
ordinary Pelargonium. Probably it was by chance that I found 
out its peculiar value, and possibly saved it from oblivion. I 
might, I daresay, have made a pecuniary gain by the discovery 
had I exhibited the plant in all its glory during the winter months 
under a new name ; but that would have been scarcely honest, 
and I have already distributed it freely amongst my friends. 
Unfortunately it rejoices in a horribly ugly name which I cannot 
pronounce—Guillon Mangilli, and it bears flowers the colours of 
which I cannot satisfactorily describe, I must therefore send some 
to the Editors for description ; but I can say that it is exceedingly 
bright with two or three shades of red, varying somewhat in 
winter according to the temperature in which it is grown. It 
flowers all through autumn, winter, and spring as freely as a Tom 
Thumb does in summer, and delights in a stove temperature, where 
it opens every pip and never damps or grows leggy. It needs no 
special cultivation beyond a warm house, from 55° by fire heat to 
75° or 80° with sun heat and air, and a position where light is 
unobstructed. Plants six months old in 6-inch pots are now 
flowering equally freely with plants which have been flowering 
continuously for almost two years, and I can assure your readers 
that they will not be satisfied with such varieties as Wonderful 
and Vesta for winter flowering when they have once seen Guil¬ 
lon Mangilli as it flowers with me. My greatest want in this 
direction is the same habit in other colours, especially a white 
one, but Guillon Mangilli seeds only sparingly, and I am afraid 
we shall have to wait some time for this ; however, I have a few 
seedlings from it for trial. A good double or semi-double white 
which would flower perpetually and bear stove treatment would 
be invaluable. I do not underrate single-flowered Pelargoniums, 
indeed I prefer them for summer flower beds, but they are of 
little use for cutting. 
Another plant more generally known than the above,'but not 
so much nor so well grown as it deserves to be, is the Celosia or 
Feathered Cockscomb. Imagine plants 18 inches or 2. feet high 
