244 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
March 21,1896. 
stand them closely together in one or more hand-lights rather 
more than half filled with sawdust or leaf mould in a forcing 
house. Put the covers on, keep quite close. Shade from sunshine, 
and damp the plants gently three or four times a day with tepid 
water until the union of stock and scion is effected. In selecting 
grafts choose short-jointed, clean, healthy shoots about 2 inches 
long and the same thickness as the stocks. 
As soon as the engrafted plants have made a little growth they 
should be gradually inured to the full light and atmospheric 
temperature of the structure in which they are growing, and be 
afforded a position near the roof glass to encourage and promote 
short-jointed and consolidated growth. When the plants have 
made 3 or 4 inches of fresh growth they should be shifted into 
3|^-inch and 4^-inch pots according to variety and the headway 
made by the individual plants, affording them a compost consisting 
of four parts sound fibrous loam, and one of leaf mould and 
pulverised horse droppings, with a dash of sharp sand added as a 
rooting medium, afterwards shifting the plants as they require 
more room at the roots, and until they have attained to the 
desired size, giving good drainage in every case. 
Plants of the Tangierine and Mandarin confined to 6-inch pots 
are very useful and attractive for decorative purposes in their 
flowering and fruiting stages. Well-conditioned Orange trees 
generally bear flowers and fruit in various stages of development at 
the same time, thereby yielding a pleasing combination of flowers 
of pearly whiteness and delicious fragrance, green and golden 
fruits intermingling with handsome shining green leaves. The 
varieties St. Michael and Maltese Blood, as is pretty well known, 
produce large fruits of fine quality, the fruits of the Tangierine 
and Mandarin being much smaller as well as earlier in ripening. 
The plants will grow, flower, and fruit freely if given a light 
well constructed house to grow in, and if a minimum temperature 
of 50° be observed during the winter months, 60° in spring time, 
running the temperature up to 80° and 85° during the summer 
months, air being freely given during the heat of the day, and the 
soil kept uniformly moist at the roots and the trees damped at 
closing time, good crops of fruit of high quality may be gathered 
therefrom during the autumn and winter months. The trees will 
be greatly benefited by frequent supplies of diluted liquid manure 
at a temperature of from 75° to 80° being given at the roots while 
swelling their crops, and by way of a change occasional surface 
dressings of any of the advertised chemical manures may advan¬ 
tageously be given immediately before applying clear tepid water 
at the roots. 
In shifting the plants into large pots or boxes the turfy loam 
should be used in a rougher state—that is, in larger pieces—than 
would be advisable for plants being placed in pots under 12 inches 
in diameter and depth, adding to each barrowful of the loam a 
10-inch potfal of fine crocks and small charcoal to insure porosity 
and a 6-inch potful of soot, the whole being well mixed before 
being used. 
In some Orange houses the central ground space is divided into 
four parts or beds for the reception of Orange trees by two 
tesselated pathways crossing each other in the centre of the house, 
and communicating with one of the same description running 
between the side and end stages and the central beds. In pre¬ 
paring these four beds for planting the trees in the original soil 
should be excavated to a depth of 3 feet, 6 inches deep of concrete 
being laid in the bottom, placing therein and on a level with a 
surface of the same, rows of gutter bricks at intervals of about 4 feet, 
sloping to one side into a main gutter connected with a waste 
water drain outside ; and on this concreted bottom lay from 9 to 
12 inches deep of brickbats, broken fine on top, covering these with 
thin turves grass side down, thereby securing perfect drainage for 
the plants. This done, the remaining space should be filled up 
with a compost consisting of the ingredients described above, and 
in the proportion indicated. The soil about the roots should be 
quite moist before the plants are turned out of the pots. The 
balls of earth and roots ought to be pricked round with a pointed 
stick to liberate any of the latter that may have become matted 
or root-bound before placing the plants in position at proper dis¬ 
tances from one another in the beds. In planting ram the soil 
firmly about the roots of the individual plants with blunt wooden 
rammers, afterwards filling up the intervening spaces and treading 
the same well together. In every other respect the treatment of 
trees thus planted is the same as that recommended for trees in 
pots.—H. W. Ward. 
PICTURESQUE GARDENING. 
“UNERRiNa Nature,” in the disposal and treatment of the 
wildlings, contributes so much enjoyment to her devotees that it 
is not a matter of surprise to find many of the calling, hedged 
about by divers rules, lines, and other restrictive agencies, 
gravitating to the free and unfettered original. That it is so is 
obvious. That it may not be freely acknowledged to be so is 
another matter. The bonds of custom and of fashion are rather to 
be gently loosed than rudely snapped. In one instance at least, a 
writer, liberal minded yet critically disposed — one who would 
rather lead a good fashion than follow a bad one—has hit the 
avocation hardly when stating that the gardener is a man whose 
chief delight is in rearing thousands of little toy plants to be 
clipped and pinched into orthodoxy. Yet, probably gardeners— 
those who have been most patient under this form of tribulation— 
have been the most eager to escape from the thraldom. 
It is not uncommon nowadays to find in some fine old gardening 
establishments, balloon trellises, pyramidal wire structures, and 
other instruments of torture, relegated to the relic chamber, 
yclept the store room ; whilst the victims, Allamandas, Bougain¬ 
villeas, and a host of tropical visitors festoon the houses at their 
own sweet will, saving that little wholesome correction needful to 
assert authority, and prevent the plant houses from being turned 
into Liberty Hall. 
These are signs of the times ; visible in the houses, more dis¬ 
cernible in the garden, and so much in evidence in many a wood¬ 
land walk or picturesque part of a demesne, that our critics may 
be impressed with the idea that the gardener is abroad. As a 
matter of fact he is very much at home, and never more so than 
when breaking away from formality and catching the spirit of that 
witchery, the inimitable worker. Nature, throws over her handi¬ 
work. Yet, whilst discipline can allow but little more than a 
suspicion of freedom in the houses or garden proper, we can, 
circumstances permitting, go forth into the open, contributing with 
a free hand at a minimum of expense and labour. 
These are but few demesnes, large or small, which do not 
present opportunities for picturesque gardening. The subject is a 
broad one, and is neither bounded by the walls of public parks or 
private places, for it includes many a piece of no man’s land by 
the king’s highway. So thought a cottager who beautified “ that 
nasty ugly spot ”—viz., a heap of road scrapings near her dwelling 
by sowing a handful of Nasturtium seeds on it. Unlettered 
probably in the higher things of gardening, yet imbued with the 
spirit of beauty in Nature, which despises not the common things 
giving means to an end. Of such is the kingdom of picturesque 
gardening. 
Yet with us there is a limit to work, if not to thought ; work 
with us must begin at home, though to specially favoured ones it 
need not stop there. Our immediate concern is to break away 
from the beaten track, and these are the strongest inducements to 
do so, for he who loves his plants in the abstract is anxious to do 
the best he can for them. An observant eye cannot fail to note 
that on the larger scale, and amid the varied aspects of an estate, 
there are to be found conditions presenting the ideal of situations 
for some special plants which are not quite happy in the orthodox 
bed or border. This is a consideration apart from the more 
natural surroundings that here obtain, and which with some plants 
is an essential not to be overlooked. Another point is, that once 
we are outside of the gardens or kept grounds the bugbear of 
tidiness no longer pursues, demanding the removal of dead or 
dying foliage acting as natural protectors during the winter season. 
Even in those localities with uncongenial surroundings are to be 
found some sheltered nooks which form veritable sun-traps. Also 
the other extreme, which, with the happy medium, offer a wide 
field for the enterprising planter. Once we step out into the 
possibilities of the natural style a new world of work and beauty 
is opened up, not necessarily in opposition to formality ; each has 
its place and purpose, and those who feel that it is so, and should 
be so, have room in their hearts for both. 
Considerations have to be entertained, in some cases, of setting 
forth plants to do or die, for here the watchful eye and ministering 
