May 16,1895. 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
425 
It was plain at first sight that whether there was phylloxera or 
not there was enough to account for the disaster without it. The house 
was full of plants in flower, including Pelargoniums, Bouvardias, 
and Euphorbias. I asked where the roots were supposed to be. The 
answer was, '■ Outside and inside.” 
On digging down outside we found a few, but very few, healthy 
roots of the previous summer’s growth, but of course there was no sign 
of new growth. How could there be when the soil was very little above 
the freezing point? It was as I had imagined, there was no disease and 
no insects, the house had been kept warm all through the autumn and 
winter for the sake of producing cut flowers and flowering plants to 
furnish a conservatory, and the Vines being inside had of course started 
early into leaf, had exhausted their stored up supply of material, and 
there was nothing more forthcoming till such time as the summer sun 
should have warmed the soil of the outside border. The roots supposed 
to be in the inside borders of such houses are generally non-existent. 
Now, there were four vineries in the establishment, and the Vines at 
one time, judging by the size of their stems, had evidently done fairly 
well, but ihe times and the people had changed, and now two of the 
houses which contained the oldest Vines were ruined, and the others, if 
the same system is persevered in, will soon follow. The most surprising 
thing was that everything excepting the Vines bore the stamp of good 
cultivation, while the Vines themselves were disgraceful. 
The lady of the establishment frankly owned, when the cause of 
failure was pointed out, that it was her own fault, and promised to give 
up at least one house, where the Vines should have the first care. But 
how many ladies and gentlemen are there who are not so reasonable, 
but who rather attribute failure to their gardener’s incompetence, when 
they have been brought on by their own acts ? Sometimes you may see 
a thing done well in a place by a man who has just one particular 
hobby, but if you see two or three totally different things done well, 
you may be sure that the man is capable of doing most things well if he 
only has the chance. 
In older times it used to be the practice to draw the Vines outside 
the house and bind them securely with haybands during the winter, 
taking them inside again some time in March, and this old plan has 
much to recommend it where the house has to be used for tender plants 
in the winter. 
The Vine will stand much bad treatment, but there are some things 
that it will rebel against. A gentleman said to me this spring, “ I wish 
you would tell me what is wrong with my Vines ; they had done fairly 
well till last year, and then the Grapes were so bad that I was glad to 
give them away to the school children to get them out of my sight.” I 
asked particulars about the border. It was outside the house, sloped 
sharply to the south, was about 4 feet wide, with a gravel walk in front, 
and “my gardener ” always grows his early Lettuces on this border. I 
concluded that as the roots had been chopped off continually in the 
so-called Vine border they had taken refuge in the gravel walk, and 
during the hot dry summer of 1893 had been starved, and showed the 
effects of it in the following year. 
I recommended taking off as much of the hard surface of the walk as 
could be done without much injury to the roots, top-dressing it with 
some good loam, crushed bones, and bonedust, and grow the early 
Lettuces elsewhere, or buy a pennyworth as wanted from one of the 
numerous shops close by. Imagine spoiling a house of Grapes, and 
perhaps also the Vines, for the sake of two or three dozen Lettuces, yet 
I believe such practice is not very uncommon, and then the proprietor 
exclaims, “ I cannot think how it is my Grapes have done so badly 1 ” 
—Wm. Taylok. 
(To be continued.) 
PRESENT rLOWERIN(4 PLANTS. 
Where a good collection of perennials are cultivated the borders 
and rockery may be made to look gay during April and May. The 
advantage of this class of plant over that of the ordinary biennial 
is a very distinct one following such a severe winter, when so much 
destruction has been dealt to Wallflowers and other plants. No part 
of the garden is more interesting than this, where so much variety of 
form and colour are obtainable. I give the names of some of the 
plants which are highly effective during the period named. 
The Anemone family is an extensive one, comprising many showy 
and useful kinds. A mass of the deep blue appenina, the paler coloured 
blanda, the rich orange-yellow of ranunculoides, the pure white 
nemorosa flore-pleno, and the somewhat strangely formed and quaintly 
coloured pulsatilla, form an interesting and varied group. All are 
dwarf, suitable for the rockery or the front of the herbaceous border, 
easily grown, and rapidly increased. 
Epimediums are not cultivated nearly so much as their merits 
deserve. Not only are their flowers interesting, but the foliage is 
extremely useful for cutting. The first to open is the pure white 
niveum, followed by the pale yellow lutea and Mariesi, all dwarf sorts, 
with richly coloured leaves. No more showy plant could be imagined 
at this season of the year than Doronicum austriacum, with its profu¬ 
sion of old gold coloured blossoms. The Bitter Vetch, Orobus vernus, is 
seldom seen in an ordinary private garden. Its purple and blue 
blossoms heavily veined with red are produced in showy masses. 
Adonis vernalis is not often ssen growing in luxuriance ; it dislikes a 
wet position and stagnation about the roots. Between two stones on 
the rcckery it seems to find its requirements. In such a position it 
flowers freely every year, _ . __ . ^ ____ 
Corydalis nobilis is the best of the Fumitories, and is well worthy & 
place in any garden. The pale yellow, green tipped blossoms are showy. 
Dicentra eximia is capital for the front of the herbaceous border, where 
it blossoms freely for several months. Its reddish purple drooping 
flowers are borne on thick fleshy stalks. Ranunculus amplexicaulia, 
with its heads of large pure white flowers, is attractive, and deserving of 
attention in all gardens. Globe-flowers are numerous now in shades of 
colour. One of the best is Trollius Ledebouri, rich orange yellow, not 
quite so deep perhaps as asiaticui, but larger individually. T. Gibsoni 
is deeper than asiaticus, and therefore deserving of extended culture- 
T. napellifolius is a large form of T. europaeus, but a shade paler in colour 
perhaps. 
Polemonium Richardson! is of compact growth, and profusely cohered 
with fine clusters of pale blue flowers. Of Irises we have pumila, 
growing barely 6 inches high, having rich purple flowers. Of Aubrietiag 
Leitchlini, dark crimson, and Henderson!, dark purple, are smothered, 
with bloom—beautiful objects for rockery or elsewhere. 
Potentilla salisburiense is a pretty plant, growing but 4 inches high, 
and bearing rich yellow single flowers. Auricula Golden Gem must not 
be passed lightly over. For the herbaceous border its golden yellow 
flowers are borne in profusion. Flowering now as freely as can be seen 
is a splendid proof of its hardiness and suitability to the purpose named. 
—E. Molyhehx. 
EXPRESS GRAPE GROWING. 
Last week’s Journal contained an interesting and instructive letter 
from the pen of Mr. John Thomson, which confirms much we should 
naturally have expected from the son of so eminent a gardener as his 
late father. I have seen many fine samples of the Clovenfords Grapes, 
and Ism pleased to hear that these famous Vines are still in such a 
satisfactory condition. 
Mr. Thomson states that their Vines planted in May, June, and July 
diu so well, and ripened their wood so thoroughly, that all of them could 
have borne heavy crops of Grapes the next season. This I readily 
believe ; the temporary Vines did bear a heavy crop, and finished the 
fruit splendidly. The only difference in Mr. Thomson’s case and mine 
was that he did not fruit his permanent Vines, and I did, arid was 
rewarded with a crop of first-class Grapes. 
I referred in my letter of last week to a house of splendid young 
Vines I saw at Gordon Castle in the autumn of 1877. I have received 
a communication from Mr. Charles Webster, the present gardener, who 
was appointed successor to his late much-respected father, and in which 
he makes the following statement, viz., “ The vinery you refer to i 
remember well assisting to plant •, but having left for Dalkeith the 
following spring I could not say how many bunches each Vine carried, 
though I know they were fruited and the crops finished well.” After 
giving details of the planting, Mr. Webster concludes by stating, “ I 
quite agree with you that young Vines can be cropped the first season, 
after planting with no bad effects to their future welfare, as I have 
myself recently proved.” 
It would be interesting to know how many of your correspondents 
have tried the experiment. As an ounce of practice is worth a pound 
of theory, I am afraid we often get a good deal of theory without much 
practice ; let them go hand in hand, and then we shall make progress. 
We are apt to run in the rut for no better a reason than that our 
fathers and grandfathers did so before us. What has become of the 
bottom heat theory in Vine borders, which was the right and proper 
thing twenty-five or thirty years ago ? 
I am inclined to believe that we have even yet much to learn in. 
Vine culture. I can see many changes taking place in both private and 
market gardens, and more especially in the latter. I notice that old 
Vines are being discarded and replaced ’oy young ones, that the large 
and expensive borders are being dispensed with and replaced by stpall 
and inexpensive ones, which can be cleared out and replaced in a very 
short space of time without losing a season or crop. 
I think everything must be done on the express system in these 
days, although I cannot lay claim to the above title, as I have put 
forward nothing particularly new. I have endeavoured to state a few 
plain facts as briefly and intelligently as I can, with the hope that it 
may encourage others, who still cling to the old theory, that they may 
with safety try the newer system, which must be coupled with judgment 
and discretion in the cropping and general management of their Vines., 
—W. INNES, Derly. _ 
Ih the articles on this subject, which are of great interest to market 
growers, showing the wonderful crops that Vines well grown can carry, 
I notice a most significant omission—viz.. What did these wonde’rful 
crops of Grapes realise per lb. ? It is not enough to say that they 
carried so-and-so and finished well, when opinions differ so much as to 
what is a good finish in a house of Grapes. The money they fetch in 
the open market is the all-important point. Perhaps Mr. Innes will say 
what his averaged per lb. I saw a house of Gros Colman last year which 
was the heaviest crop I ever saw of any Grapes. It was its second Crop 
'oorne along about 12 feet of rod, and all the bunches were left On the 
Vines, many shoots carrying three and four bunches. The house wac 
about 300 feet long, and carried 2700 bunches, which to appearance would 
average about 1| lb. each. They never finished, and would make one 
sick to look at them, half green and red in December, though I was 
surprised to see even this finish on such a crop. They brought in open 
market Is. Id. per lb., but I do not know if all the crop, or only a pail 
of it, was fit to sell.— Market Grower, 
