February s, 1883 ] JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
115 
Italy, the sum of about forty-eight million francs is thus dis¬ 
tributed among the different provinces : — Piedmont, seven 
millions ; Lombardy, nine millions; Yenetia, two millions ; 
Liguria, two and a half millions; Emilia, eight millions; the 
Marches and Umbria, one a half million ; Tuscany, two millions ; 
Lazio, 139,000 ; Meridional Adriatica, four millions and a half : 
Sicily, three millions; Sardinia, five millions ; Meridional 
Tirrena, 2,800,000 francs. 
- In the Journal of Forestry for the present month Dr. 
Lyons, M.P., has an able and exhaustive article upon the 
Re-afforesting of Ireland, which we commend to the 
attention of all who are interested in this important subject. 
Dr. Lyons has chiefly considered the matter in an historical point 
of view, stating the means by which the extensive forests that 
once existed in Ireland have been gradually destroyed, and also 
the remedial measure adopted or advocated at intervals during 
later years. 
- The Manchester City News records the death of a well- 
known local botanist, Mr. W. Horsefield, which took place on 
the 17th ult. “He was born April ICth, 1816, at Besses. His 
father was John Horsefield, who died in 1854. This John Horse- 
field was a botanist well known in his day throughout Lancashire, 
and, like many northern botanists, he was a working man. His 
son William, brought up in a home where botany was the constant 
subject of conversation, acquired a love for that delightful science, 
and from his boyhood he entered heartily into the study of it. He 
was much given to botanical excursions, and in company with 
another well-known botanist, James Percival, he rambled over 
some of the most beautiful parts of Yorkshire and Durham. For 
many years he was President of the Prestwich Botanical Society, 
and for upwards of twenty years he filled the office of postman at 
Whitefield. He was highly respected in the neighbourhood in 
which he lived a3 a man whose character was without reproach.” 
PEARS AND APPLES IN THE NORTH. 
Comte de Lamy is the most satisfactory and prolific Pear 
I had this year. I have only three trees—one against a west wall, 
the other two bush fruit trees which have not been much pruned, 
but allowed to extend their outer branches as they were alongside 
a wire fence. All three trees fruited this year and ripened 
well. Like all other districts we suffered from the severe gale of 
April 29th. I was away from home at the time in Devonshire at 
Torquay. I had left my trees behind a most promising mass of 
bloom, but, as was the case in the south—-(for I never witnessed 
such havoc as there was to the tender foliage and opening blossoms 
of all kinds of deciduous trees, not only of the Pears and Apples, 
but of the Horse Chestnut, Hawthorn, Laburnum, &c.)—so it was, 
I found, in the north, though the gale was not quite so severe. I 
left an espalier of Z6phirin Gr^goire Pear, for instance, quite 
covered with bloom. When I came back, as it was more exposed 
to the direct influence of the westerly gale than most of my Pear3, 
there was hardly a leaf, and certainly no vestige of a blossom 
left. It made fresh growth, and, oddly enough, even blossomed 
again late in August. The only position where I had any fruit 
on Apples and Pears was on the easterly side of the larger and 
older-established Apples which were not so exposed to the gale— 
a great contrast to the extraordinary crop of 1881, when we could 
hardly find room to store them. Louise Bonne of Jersey Pear, on 
a young bush tree, was also good with me. 
Beurie d’Amanlis Pear is, in my opinion, much overrated 
merely because it looks well on the table, but it has been voted 
here very little better than a Turnip. Beurrd Diel, again, is not 
worth growing north of the Trent. 
Amongst Apples I can strongly recommend as sure bearers 
Winter Hawthornden and Margil, and till one has grown Cox’s 
Orange Pippin against a south wall or in an orchard house we do 
not know what a really fine-flavoured and valuable Apple it is. 
One of the best and most highly flavoured and certain bearers 
amongst the early Apples is Irish Peach, and among the later 
sorts Wyken Pippin, which has rarely failed with me, and though 
only small is a very good-flavoured Apple. Here in the north the old 
Cockpit is good ; Improved Cockpit, which, though a larger Apple, 
keeps no better; Scotch Hunthouse, and Wellington or Dume- 
low’s Seedling are still the best for kitchen purposes during the 
winter, and the old Keswick Codlin and Lord Suffield to begin 
with ; then follow old Hawthornden and Golden Noble, with 
Alfriston and Warner’s King, which many persons are inclined 
to keep too long. I find it best with me in November and 
December, and it is one of the best kitchen Apples we have.— 
C. P. P. 
RIPENING CHRYSANTHEMUM WOOD. 
This is a subject of much importance, and should not be passed 
over without consideration and discussion. I have been anxiously 
waiting to see what the advocates of the “ ripening system ” had 
to say on this matter. If I am not mistaken the ripening of the 
wood has in previous volumes been advocated as essential, and 
one of tbe most important points in the culture of the Chrysan¬ 
themum towards producing compact, well-shaped, symmetrical 
blooms of the finest exhibition quality. But now, although a 
writer on page 22, who is evidently not a tyro in Chrysanthemum 
culture, has stated he attaches very little importance to ripening 
the wood, no one in favour of the practice has given the result of 
his experience. Has the practice been abandoned for a more 
liberal system of cultivation ? 
Like “ Grower and Exhibitor ” I consider there is no import¬ 
ance to be attached to the ripening of the wood, and that it is 
unnecessary and a waste of the energy of the plants to bring 
them to a standstill by keeping them in small pots or in any other 
manner to render the growths hard and woody. The past season 
has been notable for the absence of sun, and the blooms generally 
last autumn were not behind in size or quality those of any pre¬ 
vious year ; in fact, the past three or four years have been remark¬ 
able for heavy rainfalls and an absence of sun, yet during those 
seasons Chrysanthemum culture has made rapid progress, and 
blooms of equal merit were not staged at any previous shows that 
I had the pleasure of seeing. I prefer by no means sunless seasons 
in which to grow Chrysanthemums, but the past shows what can 
be done with unripened wood. I maintain that if the plants are 
potted as they require it, grown without check in an unshaded 
position, and secured to stakes so that air can circulate amongst 
the foliage freely, tbe wood will ripen sufficiently as it is made in 
a natural manner without the assistance of artificial means. That 
finer blooms can be produced after hot dry seasons has yet to be 
proved. What say others?-— Scientia. 
Your able correspondent Mr. G. Lyne, refers to my observa¬ 
tions on ripening the wood of these plants. I have seen much 
trouble taken, and no doubt he has too, to place plants in a posi¬ 
tion where they could receive all the rays of the sun possible, 
such as at the front of a south wall, with the object of ripening 
the wood. I have seen them kept for weeks in small pots to 
harden the wood, and have known water withheld for a time with 
the same object. These are practices that have been adopted, and 
it is making the stems quite hard and woody by such means that 
I objected to. I do not hesitate saying that such extreme and 
artificial ripening means destruction to the lower foliage. Your 
correspondent will admit that when the wood is very hard that 
the flower buds seldom open in a satisfactory manner, but come 
one-sided—in fact, are generally useless. 
I know the Chrysanthemum requires a light and airy position, 
therefore I stand the plants in single rows by the side of walks. 
I did not assert that the plants will grow satisfactorily in a shady 
position. As for buds formed in October, I should remove them 
promptly, as I am sure they would be robbing the principal 
flowers.— Grower and Exhibitor. 
CYPRIPEDIUMS. 
Though dispersed so widely through the northern hemisphere 
the species of the genus Cypripedium bear a strong likeness to 
each other in the form of their flowers, and there are few Orchids 
which are so easily distinguished by the uninitiated as the mem¬ 
bers of the Lady Slipper family. This is chiefly due to the 
prominent pouch-like labellum which in most Orchids is strangely 
formed, but in few large genera is the shape so uniform as in 
that being now considered. Both hardy and tropical species, 
European, Asiatic, and American, bear this peculiarly modified 
organ that is so obviously of special importance in the attraction 
of insects to aid in the fertilisation. The old designation of the 
British species (C. Calceolus), Calceolus Marianus, the general 
title of Ladies’ Slippers, and the American Mocassin Flowers, have 
all been derived from the form of the lip, and the generic name, 
literally Venus’s Slipper is also a classical rendering of the same 
peculiarity. The greatest difference is that between the hardy 
