August 21, 1890. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
151 
A FEW years ago when on a visit to Mr. Cannell he took me 
into a field near Swanley Station, and asked me what I 
'thought of it for growing fruit. It resembled a gravel bed as much 
as anything, only able to grow weeds, and these badly, for a few 
alone of the deep rooting kinds, such as Docks and hard wiry- 
looking grasses, were to bo seen, as if struggling hard for existence. 
It appeared as if not worth cultivating, and was not cultivated but 
neglected. It may be safely said that for agricultural purposes a 
farmer would not take such land at a rental of 53. an acre. 
Mr. Cannell does not always wait for an answer to one question 
before he asks another. IIo is a busy man, and cannot always tarry 
for responses from persons slow of speech ; and before I could 
answer him he continued, shifting his question from tho land to its 
new owner, “ Shouldn’t you consider a man who bought this land 
for fruit growing crazed?” Luckily my interlocutor could not 
pause, and went on to say, “ Philip Ladds has bought it; a remark¬ 
able man, very remarkable, he is indeed ; and he has thirty tons of 
glass on the station platform now for vineries and Peach houses, 
and if you come in three years’ time you will find thorn full of 
fruit. Mark my words, he will mako it pay ; he makes everything 
pay ; buys the worst land, and gets the best crops ; very remark¬ 
able, but it’s true ; come and see.” “ Come and see ” is a familiar 
Swanley motto, and those who accept the invitation, and especially 
"those who were acquainted with the district twenty years ago, and 
inspect the “ Home of Flowers,” Mr. Ladds’ establishment on 
tho field of gravel, and Mr. Wood’s jam manufactory, will witness 
in the trio such an example of industrial enterprise in horticulture 
as will astonish when the old order of things are remembered. To 
say that a thousand pounds’ worth of produce is raised and sold 
where only half a hundred pounds were realised before docs not 
adequately represent the advance. It is nothing less than mar¬ 
vellous, and shows what can be accomplished by men of enterprise, 
resource, energy, judgment, and ability. Mr. Cannell’s words were 
'true. Three years after inspecting tho barren, impoverished- 
looking field I had tho pleasure of seeing tons of Tomatoes, Straw¬ 
berries, and Grapes, and hundreds of tons have since been raised 
and sold from a site that ninety-nine out of a hundred gardeners 
-would have regarded as worthless, and tho man who was so bold as 
to invest in it as “ crazed.” 
On one of my visits I asked Mr. Ladds what induced him to 
secure the land that looked so unpromising. I knew there must be 
a reason, for men who achieve brilliant successes do not act without 
thinking. “ Well,” he replied, in his quiet way, and pointing with 
his finger, “ do you see that tree ?” This was a splendid Oak 
standing alone and majestic—and he continued, “ Do you think 
land with nothing in it could grow a tree like that ? I know it 
•couldn’t ; and it was that tree which I took as my guide. And 
another thing, you can’t poison land like this with muck, but can 
feed it well and it is always sweet, and that’s the sort to grow fruit 
in.” So it has proved very conclusively. “ Philip ” has fed the 
land lavishly, and drawn from it abundantly, and without any 
doubt the property is worth a hundred times more than when he 
secured it, and I should be very much surprised to learn that it has 
not increased in value fivo hundredfold. As Mr. Cannell says, it 
is all “very remarkable.” Here is a man who started with a 
basket, worked till he was tho proud possessor of a barrow, then 
No. 030 ,—Vol. XXI., Tuikd Seeies. 
aspired to a cart, next to a van, and now takes pride in the best 
hunters that money can buy—all done in a generation—and ho is the 
same plain unassuming man he was when he started on his industrial 
career some thirty years ago. 
We will now pass from Kent, into Surrey, and glance at the 
progress that has been made by another busy worker in the hive of 
horticulture—one who came from Scotland fourteen years ago, 
and like the famous warrior of old, “ came, saw, and conquered ” 
—Mr. James Walker of Daffodil fame, whose new field of labour 
at Ham Common I have lately had the pleasure of inspect¬ 
ing. Mr. Walker was an amateur florist when he arrived in the 
south, full of zeal, but tempered with prudence and the cool sound 
judgment that is characteristic of tho race to which he belongs. 
He had a desire to engage in commercial horticulture, and to this 
end took the wise courso of closely examining what others were 
doing, and of becoming acquainted with the manners and customs 
of the trade at the great emporium, Covent Garden Market. Ho 
endeavoured to ascertain the growing taste of the public, so that he 
might cater the better for it, and therefore for himselc. lie sought 
out the fields of production, and eventually leased land at Whitton. 
Ho noticed the increasing demand for Daffodils, and prepared to 
moot it, and was not long before ho was able to purchase nearly a 
thousand pounds’ worth of bulb3 in one season. The more flowers 
he grew—grew well, be it understood, and placed in tho market in 
the best condition—tho greater was tho demand, and this he could 
only meet by growing them in millions and by the acre. With care 
and good culture his bulbs increased enormously, and from a grower 
of flowers for market he grew into a wholesale vendor of bulbs 
Strongly convinced that hardy bulbs could be grown at home as 
well as abroad, he set himself to the work with quiet pertinacity, 
and the result is that he can now supply the Dutchmen bettor than 
the Dutchmen can supply him with certain kinds. He executes 
orders of 100,000 at homo and abroad, and could sell Daffodil and 
Narcissus bulbs by the ton if required and the terms were right. 
His lease approaching termination he looked about him for 
another field to which he might migrate. His eye fell on a farm 
of nearly 140 acres at Ham Common, sandy poor-looking land, 
wild with weeds. He satisfied himself that tho impoverished and 
weed-infested land was deep, and that being so conceived that 
labour and manure could be profitably invested in it, and to secure 
this land paid I dare not say how much for the practically worth¬ 
less crops that were in it. Very accommodating sort of land he 
regards it, free to work, and so deep that when the sand is pushed 
aside in the driest weather moisture is found, w,hile if the rain it 
raineth every day it passes down freely, and there is no stagnation. 
Shrewd, observant, calculating, Mr. Walker has re-established him¬ 
self, and has evidently faith in the future, or he would not have 
erected the bulb stores and splendid ranges of glass, nor planted 
fruit trees so extensively. He ^is a strong believer in bulbs and 
fruit, and is convinced that both can be grown at homo as good 
in quality as can be imported, and at prices remunerative to the 
cultivator. He has found that Daffodils yield two crops the 
flowers above ground and bulbs below, and also that they profitably 
occupy the land between his fruit trees ; and if all these had been 
Lord Grosvenor Apples, as many are, they would this year have 
afforded him nearly 10s. worth of fruit per tree four years after 
planting. 
But to revert to the bulb.s. At the time of my visit, a fort¬ 
night ago, ten men were digging them, and had been digging for 
weeks. They are probably digging yet, for the work is somewhat 
tedious, and the extent of ground occupied considerable. Lou see 
acres of weeds—land apparently lying waste, but it is full of 
money—bulbs. The weeds are not considered to do harm, but 
rather good in shading the soil, and every time the fork is turned 
over, or rather every other time, out tho bulbs come in clusters. 
“The men are expert at the work and know exactly how deep to dig 
to turn the crust and reveal the necks of tho Daffodils, and tho 
No. 2180. — Vol. LXXXIH., Old Sebies* 
