March 15, 1883. ] JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 217 
- The London Koyal Botanic Society’s Exhibitions 
for this year will be held in the Botanic Gardens, Regent’s Park, 
as follows :—Spring shows, March 28th and April 25th ; summer 
shows, May 16th and June 13tb. Evening Fete and Exhibition, 
June 27th, and a special show of Roses by Messrs. W. Paul Sc Son, 
Waltham Cross, May 2nd to 10th. Botanical lectures will be held 
on Fridays in May and June at 4 p.m., and promenades on Wed¬ 
nesdays in May, June, and July at 3.30 p.m. Liberal prizes are 
offered at all the shows, the provision for Orchids, Pelargoniums, 
stove and greenhouse plants, Roses, and fine-foliage plants beiDg 
especially good. 
- We have received the following communication in re¬ 
ference to A NEW PUBLIC PARK AT Bedford. The Corporation 
of Bedford, having recently decided to appropriate 61 acres of land 
adjoining the cemetery for the purpose of forming a public park, 
offered a prize of twenty-five guineas for the best set of plans for 
laying out the same. The Park Committee met on Friday last, 
and unanimously decided to adopt the plans of Messrs. Barron and 
Son of Elvaston Nurseries, Borrowash. The site is admirably 
adapted for a public park, the ground sloping gradually to the 
south. The prize plans provide for a piece of ornamental water 
in the south-east or lower portion of the park about three acres in 
extent. Large open spaces are devoted to cricket, football, and 
parade ground. The two main entrances are at either end of a 
new road 100 feet in width, which the Corporation propose to 
construct along the southern boundary of the park. A refresh¬ 
ment pavilion surrounded by a flower garden occupies a con¬ 
spicuous position, leading from which is an avenue of Lime trees 
terminated by a fountain. Tennis lawns, bowling green, archery 
ground, and a gymnasium are provided, also designs for an 
entrance lodge, band stand, rustic shelters, &c. 
- Relative to the distribution of Auricula Seed on 
behalf of “ Single-handed,” we found that to have sent the 
seed in the order in which the letters were opened would have 
placed applicants in distant parts of the country at an unfair 
disadvantage, as the letters of many, even if sent immediately 
on receipt of the Journal, could not possibly reach us the same 
week. We determined, therefore, to distribute the seed as equi¬ 
tably as possible on Tuesday night, returning stamps to those 
to whom we could not send the number of packets desired. The 
demand has very far exceeded the supply, and we have been 
compelled to return the whole of the stamps, less one in each 
case for postage, that reached us on Wednesday morning. 
- We learn from the schedule to hand that the Manchester 
National Horticultural Exhibition will be held in the 
Botanic Gardens, Old Trafford, from May 11th to 18th of the 
present year, when the usual liberal prizes will be offered in 
seventy-nine classes for plants, flowers, and fruits. Orchids are 
well provided for, eight classes being devoted to them, the prizes 
ranging from £16 to £2, one class being for ten bond fide speci¬ 
mens, in which “ made up ” specimens will disqualify the exhibitor. 
Stove and greenhouse plants, fine-foliage plants, Pelargoniums, 
hardy plants, and miscellaneous collections all have special classes 
devoted to them. There is an announcement in the schedule to 
the effect that a new exhibition house one-third larger than the 
old one has been erected, and the Council are desirous that the 
first show held in the new building shall be a very fine one ; they 
therefore invite exhibitors to aid them as much as possible. 
- During the past week the weather has been unusually 
severe, and has seriously interfered with garden and land work 
generally. Low temperatures, keen winds, and several falls of 
snow have had a most injurious effect upon the advancing vegeta¬ 
tion, though probably the results would have been worse a week 
or two hence. Around London the fruit trees appear to be 
scarcely sufficiently advanced to suffer much injury, though the 
bracts surrounding the Pear buds have been much browned in 
several cases. This is very observable in the Royal Horticultural 
Society’s Garden, Chiswick, where also a few early Peaches seem 
to be in danger. The effects, however, cannot at present be accu¬ 
rately estimated. At Chiswick the lowest temperature registered 
was last Thursday and Friday, when the thermometer fell to 21° 
Fahr. As, however, will be seen from the following notes, much 
lower temperatures have been experienced. 
- Mr. W. Taylor of Longleat Gardens writes :—"We are 
having a veritable winter here, and coming when the Peach trees 
are in bloom it is rather awkward. Our minimum temperatures 
4 feet from the ground from the 7th to the 12th inclusive have 
been 26°, 25°, 24°, 17^°, 18°, and 22°. On the grass it was 24°, 22°, 
21°, 11°, 12°, and 17°. Ice is l£ inch thick ; we purpose carting 
some to-morrow should the present weather continue. There was 
ice inside the glass of all our hothouses on the 10th, and some 
shoots of Vines almost in flower in an old-fashioned house, where 
the trellis is too close to the roof, were frozen to the glass. A few 
of them which the sun touched early have the appearance of being 
scorched, but they are not so much hurt as I imagined they would 
be. The thermometer in this house did not go below 54° during 
the night.” 
- Mr. G. Abbey, Paxton Park Gardens, St. Neots, also writes 
as follows respecting the weather —“ On the night of March 
10th 15° of frost were registered here, the temperature falling to 
17° Fahr. The last few days have been very cold and the ground 
covered with snow; on the 8th it lay 4 to 6 inches deep. The sun 
has much reduced the depth of snow, but in the shade frost has 
prevailed throughout the day.” 
- Mr. F. Taylor writes from Welbeck—“ The thermometer 
registered 7° at eleven o’clock on Friday night, the 9 th. At 
five o’clock on Saturday morning the 10th, 2°, or 30° of frost. 
This is 3° more frost than we have had any time during this 
winter, and to assist in its work of destruction the sun came out 
bright and powerful, registering 67° by ten o’clock—a rise of 65° 
in five hours. I believe all the bloom of early-flowering shrubs is 
completely destroyed. The buds of Lilac, Ribes, and young growth 
of Roses to all appearance are as bad as if they had been baked 
in front of a fire.” 
- Messrs. Collins Brothers Sc Gabriel write to us 
a3 follows on Anemone fulgens and Corbularia citrina— 
“ Anemone fulgens blooms are not sent to Covent Garden as cut 
flowers, but varieties of coronaria and hortensis. The flowers 
6ent you were for your opinion as to quality, they were sent over 
from France to us cut from our roots. The Narcissus corbularia 
citrina is a rarity scarcely known in English gardens, and very 
difficult to procure even in their native habitat, the south of 
France, and we do not suppose a single blossom has ever been 
sold in Covent Garden.” [We did not mention Covent Garden, 
and the term “ market ” was employed as we were under the 
impression that the flowers in question were sent to this country 
for sale, and that Messrs. Collins Sc Gabriel had a market for 
them. Having grown all the Anemones mentioned, some of them 
for thirty years, we claim some acquaintance with their relative 
characters, and we cannot say how many times we have seen all 
of them sold in Covent Garden Market. We never saw more 
richly coloured flowers than those sent to us, while those of the 
Bulbocodium were charming, and plants ought to be grown in all 
gardens where dwarf early spring flowers are cherished.] 
- Mr. F. W. Burbidge, F.L.S., Curator of the Trinity 
College Botanic Garden, Dublin, recently delivered a lecture on 
domestic gardening under the auspices of the Ratbgar Sanitary 
and Health Association. There was a crowded attendance, and 
the chair was taken by Mr. J. F. Lombard, J.P. The lecturer, 
