January 12, 1893. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
25 
recognise the powerful nature of their claims to call attention to 
them whenever a word in season is likely to prove effective. 
At Ascott I am told that Mr. Jennings grows the magnificent 
Gloire de Sceaux about as well and extensively as he does the 
Malmaison Carnations. If this be so they must present a sight the 
equal of which it would be difficult to find in the winter and spring, 
for a nobler plant there is not in the whole genus. Paterfamilias 
at the Swanley home of fiowers is to be credited with its introduc¬ 
tion, and it is one of the winter gems of his happy family. In a 
large house devoted to the winter-fiowering section there the 
handsome foliage, not less than the charming flowers of this most 
beautiful plant, win the deepest admiration. In some spring notes 
on Woodstock Park, near Sittingbourne, I commented on the high 
place it holds in the estimation of that good gardener Mr. Dowdes- 
well. There is nothing more effective there during the winter and 
spring. There cannot be the slightest doubt that it is one of the 
plants which have distinctly come to spread. The habit is 
admirable, the plant having a free open style of growth, and dis¬ 
playing its burnished leaves to the greatest advantage. The colour 
of the foliage is a point on which it is difficult to take a decided 
position. Eeddish bronze would perhaps describe it the best, but 
however that might be it is both distinct and highly effective. 
Displayed amongst other plants it gives a warmth that is much 
appreciated in the cold dull season. It has “ tone,” as an artist 
would say. But the leaves are by no means the only effective part 
of the plant. The flowers, which are large and flat, are of a 
beautiful lustrous shining pink, a colour which, if not strictly 
fashionable, never fails to charm. If I might venture a word of 
advice to those who have a warm house to furnish in the winter, 
and wish its occupants to be select, I should say. Whatever your 
estimate of the Begonia genus as a whole may be put Gloire de 
Sceaux amongst the indispensables. There are two other dark- 
foliaged sorts fairly well known, Saturne andhydrocotilifolia. The 
latter is a very old friend, but Saturne is generally admitted to be 
a more effective plant, and though inferior to Gloire de Sceaux it 
has decided merit. 
A green-foliaged Begonia of considerable value is undulata. 
It makes an admirable basket plant, and would, no doubt, look 
effective in a vase. The leaves are a deep green with a lighter 
margin, and the flowers are reddish salmon. Foliosa is hardly less 
valuable for the purposes suggested. Its leaves are small and 
dark green in hue, its fiowers white with more than a mere sus¬ 
picion of pink. This is a really good and graceful plant, well 
worthy of recognition. The variety Vernon or semperflorens 
atropurpurea is as useful for winter as for summer flowering, and 
its compact habit, free blooming, and pleasing bronzy leafage 
present a combination of attractions not easy to pass over. These 
are all as much esteemed for their leaves as for their flowers. Of 
these more particularly cultivated for blossom, nitida hardly needs 
a description, but it is too good to be excluded. Its variety alba 
odorata also merits a place, for, although the flowers are smaller 
than those of nitida, they are pure white and fragrant. It 
would be difficult to name two more useful sorts than these for 
winter work. Semperflorens gigantea carminea is effective in 
growth, its deep green leafage being distinctly striking, and its rich 
carmine red flowers being borne in great profusion. Odoratissima 
is another charming variety of the semperflorens group. 
A winter Begonia which is not of very old standing, but which 
has well proved its claims for a place, is Carrierei. This makes a 
delightful plant, not remarkable for great beauty of either foliage 
or bloom, but so full of flower under ordinary treatment as to win 
invariable admiration. Its easy management is a point not devoid 
of importance. Fuchsioides well merits its name, the clusters of 
beautiful pink flowers being both graceful and pleasing. 
Knowsleyana, silvery blush, has had its praises sung in the Journal 
more than once, and is so free growing and profuse in blooming 
that the present mention of it is not out of place. It makes an 
admirable plant, and is also valuable for cutting. Polyantha has 
flowers of a delicate pink shade, and they are very serviceable for 
sprays or even for working into buttonholes. Digswelliana is 
another pink that is now fairly familiar, but less so is Hybrida 
Wellsiana, which has drooping flowers of a pleasing red. Bijou de 
Gand is a pronounced midwinter bloomer, and bears its flowers in 
great profusion, while it is dwarf and bushy in growth. Insignis 
incarnata, lilac-pink ; prestoniensis, rich orange red ; Paul Bruant, 
pink ; and socotrana, bright rose, are a valuable quartette. It 
would be easy to add to their number, for there are many others 
well worth mentioning, but there is often confusion rather than 
safety in numbers. 
The feast of winter beauty which these plants provide is no 
meagre one ; the question is their utilisation. The purposes they 
serve are numerous, and there are few establishments where no use 
could be found for them. Owing as we do a special debt of gratitude 
to all plants which give us brightness in the dull season, we ought to 
look with special kindness on these Begonias, and there is much 
satisfaction to be found in the clear signs which exist of their 
growing popularity.—W. P. W. 
IN MEMORIAM—MR. W. I. PALMER. 
Horticulturists in Reading and the neighbourhood have sustained 
a very heavy loss in the death of Mr. William Isaac Palmer, one of the 
heads of the great biscuit firm. He passed away somewhat suddenly at 
the age of sixty-eight, and the occurrence came as a calamitous surprise 
to his thousands of friends, proteg6s, and admirers ; for notwithstanding 
the fact that he closely approached the span of threescore and ten, he 
was a man of great vigour and had enjoyed robust health. We need hardly 
call special attention here to Mr. Palmer’s life-long work in the cause of 
temperance or to the munificence of his public gifts, but it may not be 
out of place to mention the extraordinary extent of his private charity, 
the facts of which were sedulously kept secret during his lifetime, and 
have only come to light on the occasion of his death. He distributed a 
very large sum yearly unknown even to his intimate friends, and 
numerous poor widows in Reading were in receipt of weekly sums for 
assisting them in their struggle to live. 
The deceased philanthropist—for such he was in the best sense of 
the term—was a great supporter of every movement for improving the 
condition and brightening the lives of the people. He took a special 
interest in horticulture, supporting the gardening societies in every 
possible way, and delighted in working in his own garden. At one time 
he was a very successful cultivator of Verbenas, while Pelargoniums, 
Roses, Chrysanthemums, and stove plants have all been grown exceed¬ 
ingly well at his residence. Hillside, Reading. Few men of culture and 
education were so broad in their tastes and sympathies as he. He 
closely followed the wonderful course of improvement in choice florists’ 
flowers that has been going on in Messrs. Sutton & Sons’ nursery for so 
many years, and while appreciating to the full their splendid strains of 
Primulas, Cyclamens, Cinerarias, Begonias, and other plants, was wont 
to say that he was still able to appreciate second class flowers. Modest 
blossoms in small gardens always won his admiration, and he was never 
weary of giving encouragement to all who endeavoured to add refine¬ 
ment to their lives of labour. At the funeral, which took place on 
Monday last, the leading firms, headed by Messrs. Sutton & Sons, 
closed their establishments, rich and poor alike mourning the loss of 
one whose exhaustless sympathy caused him to be looked upon as a 
friend rather than as a benefactor. May flowers shed their sweetest 
fragrance over the grave of one who loved them well, and strove to 
extend their influences far and wide. 
PRICES AND QUALITY OF APPLES—CANKER. 
I HAVE been waiting with some curiosity to see how Mr. Walter 
Kruse would extricate himself from the position in which his own 
words and his own figures had placed him. I took them as he gave 
them, without cavil or comment, giving him his own rope, so to say ; 
but when the result showed that the average price of the Apples, of 
which Domino was one, was within a fraction of the figure, which in 
the case of his own fruit (“ the finest and best packed ” that ever went 
into the market) he admitted to be “ very exceptional,” he finds he has 
no time to go into the question, and must decline to continue the 
discussion. Considering that he found time to open it unsolicited, the 
pressure that compels this abrupt termination is not without significance. 
However, it is of no use my dwelling upon the matter further. I 
will therefore leave the subject, with the assurance to Mr. Kruse that 
I shall be only too happy to return to it should he care to wrestle 
another friendly fall with me when the present inroads upon his 
leisure have ceased. Perhaps I may add a recommendation that he 
should endeavour to spare a few moments for reading the letters from 
“ A Yorkshireman ” and “ A Sussex Grower,” on page 6 ; also those 
from Mr. Pearson and Mr. Molyneux, in the issue of December 15th. 
Further, I will add that I supplied to the Editor authority for every 
statement I have made as to the prices of Apples, from the Is. 6d. 
per bushel Dominos to the £100 per acre Cox’s ; and the fact that 
those statements were allowed to appear may be taken as a proof that 
their accuracy is not questioned. I now send the sales bill of a London 
fruit broker, showing that the highest price obtained was 10s. and the 
lowest Is. 6d., the nine varieties averaging within a fraction of 5s. ll^d. 
per bushel. 
Turning to the question of canker, I have read the letters on the 
subject which have recently appeared with great interest. What Mr. 
Kruse has said about his soil and the applications made to it must have 
aroused the attention of many fruit growers, especially if, as in several 
cases on which comments have been made to me, it has been considered 
in connection with the remark in another letter, that his yearly manure 
bill for a farm of 10 acres amounts to £500. Most fruit growers agree 
with Mr. Tonks that the question of nutriment is at the bottom of many 
cases of canker, and it is important, therefore, that we should have 
detailed information as to the exact quantities of the different 
ingredients supplied in order to form a judgment that may be of 
practical value. In other words, I ask Mr. Kruse, in the public interest, 
to be good enough to tell us how his £500 a year is laid out. When he 
reflects that his answer may have an important bearing on the canker 
question which he has raised, and when I tell him that I also ask on 
behalf of one of the principal authorities on fruit in the country, I doubt 
not he will readily grant my request.—W. P. W. 
