October 7, 1686. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
325 
have to take part in the public competition at Chrysanthemum exhibitions 
now becoming so general. The article on judging, page 267, I consider one 
of the most interesting in the whole series, and ought to be well read by all 
competitors and adjudicators. The method of judging by points and 
marks I consider the correct one, and ought to be universally adopted in 
all close competitions. I have always been a strong advocate for depth 
in a flower. It is a greater criterion of good cultivation than mere size 
in diameter, hence I was pleased to see Mr. Wright place such weight on 
the depth and solidity of blooms. I was rather disappointed at not 
seeing anything about smoothness and shape of petal, or florets, embodied 
in the article. Without a perfectly smooth petal I am well aware we 
cannot get finish in the proper sense of the term, although a bad-petalled 
variety might be finished as good as cultivation and dressing can make it. 
My idea of a perfect petal is found in the smooth ivory florets of the 
Venus, and also in some of the Queen family, and in Mrs. Heales and 
Princess of Wales. Contrast a petal of White Venus with the thin and 
somewhat jagged edges of Jeanne d’Arc as it often comes, and the quality 
and effect is very apparent. Some varieties have very forked or stringy 
petals, as in the cam of Jardin des Plantes and the bronze sport from that 
variety, which is very objectionable, and flowers with these defects ought 
not to be used if possible. I should like to take this opportunity of con¬ 
gratulating Mr. Molyneux on the completion of his work. No one has appre¬ 
ciated the articles and the feeling that prompted them more than myself, 
and I feel sure that their contents are highly valued by your readers, and 
I, for one, shall be much surprised if the practical knowledge thus early 
and effectively made public does not bear fruit in the higher quality of 
the exhibits that I anticipate will be seen in the coming exhibitions 
throughout the country.—C. Okchard, Coombe Warren. 
I have grown Belle Paule for the first time this year. The plants 
grew well from the start, rivalling Fair Maid of Guernsey in height and 
substance. They set good buds early in August, which I was afraid to 
u take,” so I run the shoots on to the next bud, but when I could just see 
the break the end of the shoots commenced withering, and I shall not 
have a flower from the two plants. Can anyone tell me if it is a peculiarity 
•of that sort, as no other sort has ever done so with me ? I notice in the 
catalogue of the National Society that Mdlle. Madeleine Tezier is classed 
as a Japanese, Minuie Chat6 as a Hybrid (Japanese) Anemone, Emperor 
as a large-flowered Anemone. Mr. Molyneux selects, and has well shown, 
Mdlle. Madeleine Tezier as a reflexed ^Minnie C'natd he selects as a large- 
flowered Anemone ; and a stand of large-flowered Anemones was dis¬ 
qualified at the Crystal Palace Show last year through containing 
Emperor, which was ruled a Japanese Anemone. 
It seems to me that whoever exhibits any of these three varieties runs 
the risk of being disqualified in whichever class he puts them in, while to 
leave out Mdlle. Tezier from a stand of reflexed might make the difference 
between winning and losiog. I do not find any rule binding societies 
which are affiliated to the National to their (the National) classification, 
or even binding their own judges to it, except in the case of synonyms. 
I hope Mr. Molyneux’s valuable articles will be published in the form 
of a book.— Chrysanthemum. 
[We have reason to believe they will be so published.] 
BIRKENHEAD’S BEETLE TRAP. 
We give prominence[to this simple article because we have recently 
had conclusive evidence of its great efficiency. It is not only an excel- 
lent means of diminishing the numbers of beetles in dwellings and glass 
8 ^^pu^ Ll^e8, crickets and cockroaches. The proprietors say :— 
These traps were invented by us for use in our Fern houses, and having 
proved successful to a degree far beyond our anticipition we are now 
manufacturing them on a large scale, that all who are troubled with these 
pests may have the long-desired means of exterminating them at a small 
cost. In a short time, by using several traps, we succeeded in catching 
in our Fern houses over 5000 cockroaches, crickets, and woodlice, of all 
sizes, from very small to very large ones. We are continually having 
evidence of the utility if the traps in customers who have tried them 
sending for more for themselves and their friends, in addition to which 
we hear many reports from those who have caught large numbers (often 
iw to 200) cockroaches, &c., in a single night.” We are not in the least 
inclined to question the accuracy of those reports, since we have caught 
upwards of 2000 beetles tnd crickets in one of these traps during a period 
of ten nights, and that is our justification for recommending this cheap 
article to all whose premises may be infested with the pests in question. 
THE PAST HISTORY OF EXISTING- PLANTS. 
[An address 1 read before the British Association by William Carruthers, President L.S., 
F.R.3., F.G.S.] 
( Continued from page 305.) 
Before passing from these Egyptian plants I would draw atttention to 
the quality of the cereals. They are good specimens of the cereals still 
cultivated. This observation is true also of the cultivated grains which I 
have examined, belonging to prehistoric times. The Wheat found in the 
purely British portion of the ancient village explored by General Pitt- 
Rivers is equal to the average of Wheat cultivated at the present day. This 
is the more remarkable, because the two samples from the later Romano- 
British period obtained by General Pitt-Rivera are very much smaller, 
though they are not unlike the small hard grains of Wheat still cultivated 
on thin chalk soils. The Wheat from lake-dwellings in Switzerland, for 
which I am indebted to Mr. J. T. Lee, F.G.S., are fair samples. My 
colleague, Mr. W. Fawcett, has recently brought me from America grains of 
Maize from the prehistoric mounds in the valley of the Mississippi, and 
from the tombs of the Incas of Peru, which represent also fair samples of 
this great food substance of the New World. The early ppoples of both 
worlds had then under cultivation productive varieties of these important 
food-plants, and it is remarkable that in our own country, with all the appli¬ 
ances of scientific cultivation and intelligent farming, we have not been 
able to appreciably surpass the grains which were harvested by our rude 
ancestors of 2000 years ago. 
In taking a further step into the past, and tracing the remains of existing 
species of plants preserved in the strati of the earth’s crust, we must neces¬ 
sarily leave behind all certain chronology. Without an intelligent observer 
and recorder there can be no definite determination of time. We can only 
speculate as to the period required for effecting the changes represented by 
the various deposits. 
The peat bogs are composed entirely of plant-remains belonging to the 
flores existing in the regions where they occur. They are mainly surface- 
accumulations still being formed and going back to an unknown antiquity. 
They are subsequent to the last changes in the surface of the country, and 
represent the physical conditions still prevailing. 
The period of great cold during which Arctic ice extended far into 
temperate regions was not favourable to vegetable life. But in some 
localities we have stratified clays with plant-remains later than the Glacial 
epoch, yet indicating that the great cold had not then entirely disappeared. 
In the lacustrine bed3 at Holderness is found a small Birch (Betula nana, L), 
now limited in Great Britain to some of the mountains of Scotland, but 
found in the Arctic regions of the Old and New World and in Alpine 
districts in Europe, and with it Prunus Padus, L., Quercus Robur, L„ 
Corylus Avellana, L., Alnus glutinosa, L., and Pinus sylvestris, L. In the 
white clay beds at Bovey Tracey of the same age there occur the leaves of 
Arctostaphylos Uva-Ur.-i, L., three species of Willow—viz., Salix cinerea, 
L., S. myrtilloides, L., and S. polaris, Wahl., and in addition to our alpine 
Betula nana, L., the more familiar B. alba, L. In beds of the same age in 
Sweden, Nathorst has found the leaves of Dryas octopetala, L., and Salix 
herbacea, L., this being associated with S. polaris, Wahl. Two of these 
plants have been lost to our flora from the change of climate that has taken 
place—viz., Salix myrtilloides, L., and S. polaris, Wahl.; and Betula nana, 
L., has retreated to the mountains of Scotland. Three others (Dryas octo¬ 
petala, L., Arctostaphylos Uva-Ursi, L., and Salix herbacea, L.), have with¬ 
drawn to the mountains of Northern England, Wales, and Scotland, while 
the remainder are still found scattered over the country. Notwithstanding 
the diverse physical conditions to which these plants have been subjected, 
the remains preserved in these beds present no characters by which they can 
be distinguished from the living representatives of the species. 
W e meet with no further materials for careful comparison with existing 
species until we get beyond the great period of intense cold which imme¬ 
diately preceded the present order of things. The Glacial epoch includes 
four periods during which the cold was intense, separated by intervals of 
somewhat higher temperature, which are represented by the intervening 
sedimentary deposits. During these alterations of temperature extensive 
changes in the configuration of the land were taking place. The first great 
upheaval occurred in the early Glacial period, and was followed by a con¬ 
siderable subsidence. A second upheaval took place late in the Glacial 
epoch. Various estimates have been formed of the time required for this 
succession of climatic conditions and earth movements. The moderate com¬ 
putation of Ramsay and Lyall gives to the boulder-clay of the first Glacial 
period an age of 250,000 years, estimating the time of the first upheaval as 
200,000 years ago, while the subsidence took place 50,000 years later, and 
the second upheaval 92,000 years ago. 
The sedimentary deposits later than the Pliocene strata, but older than 
the Glacial drift, indicate an increasing severity in the climate, which 
reached its height in the first Glacial period. 
At Cromer, on the Norfolk coast, the newest of these deposits has 
supplied the remains of Salix polaris, Wahl., S. cinerea, L., and Hypnum 
turgescens, Schimp. This small group of 'plants is of great interest in 
connection with the history of existing species ; their remains are preseivtd 
in such a manner as to permit the closest comparison with living plains. 
Such an examination shows that they differ from each other in no particular. 
In the post-Glacial deposits in Sweden, Salix herbacea, L., is associated with 
S. polaris, Wahl., as I have already stated. These two Willows are v ry closely 
related, having indeed been treated as the same species until Wahlentn-rg 
pointed out the characters which separated them when he established Salix 
polaris as a distinct species in 1812. One of the most obvious of the specific 
distinctions is the form and venation of the leaf, a character which is, 
however, easily overlooked, but when once detected is found to be so 
constant that it enables one to distinguish without hesitation the one 
species from the other. The leaves of the two Willows in the Swedish bed 
present all tie peculiarities which they possess at the present day, and the 
