538 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ December 1?, 1888. 
are flat, and generally exactly the colour of the trunk, shoot, or 
twig upon which they are laid. Those that have been recognised 
are observed to be large for the size of the insects. Sometimes 
they occur in twos and threes, at others in groups of fifty or a 
hundred. 
Sometimes they are placed upon the leaf or flower-buds ; for 
example, we may see them upon the leaf-buds of the Rose, when 
they are enlarging in February or March, looking like very tiny 
grains of gunpowder. It is probable that some seasons these eggs 
hatch out earlier than is generally supposed, and hence the importance 
of well cleaning, by the syringe and other means, all shrubs or trees 
which have been infested with aphides before a new brood can 
appear. We should, however, make a great mistake if we supposed 
aphides are entirely quiescent through the winter, because that is 
the season when eggs are found. There are plenty of them lively 
and active in various places, not only feeding at intervals, but 
engaged in the work of continuing the species, the females pro¬ 
ducing living young, wingless like themselves. When bedding plants 
and other tender exotics, which have been out of doors during the 
summer, are carried into houses for the cold season, some aphides 
are sure almost to accompany them, and the warmth favours the 
increase of the insects. Aphides also live through the winter 
under fragments of loose bark, and certainly upon several of our 
common evergreens. A. Rumicis has been found plentifully upon 
the Ivy at that season, but whether they really succeed in obtaining 
the sap from its uninviting leaves is uncertain. It is possible 
aphides can endure a fast, and that from evergreens they migrate 
to the early growth of fresh leaves along the banks and lanes. 
But the necessity of attending to plants in houses is shown by the 
tendency Aphis opima, a large green kind, stained with darker 
green, has to multiply when it can have warmth and moderate 
moisture. It haunts several favourite plants, hut specially the 
Cineraria, and does much harm, as it not only exhausts the plants, 
but seems to exert some poisonous influence upon them. Again, 
there are aphides that through the winter hide underground, feed¬ 
ing upon the roots of plants, just as the too-well-known Pemphigus 
Lactucac occurs upon the Lettuce in summer. And possibly some 
of the aphides of our fruit trees, when their branches are bare, 
retire to their roots, or to those of humbler plants close by. All 
our recent observations upon aphis life indicate how very important 
it is to give such encouragement as we can to their many enemies 
of the insect race, which keep down their numbers far more 
effectually than we can with our best efforts. Thus the Coccinellse, 
or ladybirds, are busily engaged, both as beetles and larvae, from 
spring to autumn, each slaying its hundreds of aphides, and through 
the winter they are lurking in nooks and crannies ready for the 
first appearance of their prey ; and it is one objection to some of 
our modes of aphis slaughter that we kill friends with foes.—- 
Entomologist. 
E vents of the W eek. —After the bustle and excitement of the 
recent exhibitions Chrysanthemum growers and exhibitors will have 
enjoyed a period of well-earned rest, and this (Thursday) evening the 
occasion of the National Chrysanthemum Society’s dinner will afford 
them an opportunity of discussing the incidents of the past season. The 
dinner will take place at Anierton’s Hotel, Fleet Street, London, and 
is to commence at 6 p.m. The events of the week as regards meetings 
and sales are few. To-day (13th December) there will be a sale of 
Orchids and Liliums at Stevens’ Booms, King Street, Covent Garden, 
and of Dutch bulbs at Protheroe & Morris’s Booms, Cheapside. The 
following day there will be a sale of Orchids at the latter establishment, 
and of Liliums, Dutch bulbs, Boses, &c., at Smails’ Booms. On the 15th 
there will be a sale of Dutch bulbs at Stevens’ Booms. 
- The W eather in London.—T he present week has been, much 
colder than the two or three preceding it. There have been heavy rime 
frosts from 10° to 15° being registered in the suburbs. A dense fog 
enveloped the metropolis on Monday and part of Tuesday, but has dis¬ 
appeared. 
- Gardeners’ Orphan Fund.—W e understand that Mr. A. J. 
Brown, Hon. local Secretary for Sussex of the above Fund, is staying 
for a short timeiin Wensleydale, and with the co-operation of Mr. Hall, 
gaidener to Lord Bolton, making an effort to hold an entertainment in 
Bedmire Town Hall in aid of the Fund. Gardeners in the district arc 
invited to assist. The date will be shortly announced. 
- Messrs. Foster & Pearson, Beeston, send us an Office 
Almanack in twelve sheets, for the different months, and ask us to 
say that any gardener is welcome to a copy who may not have received 
one. It is useful for suspending as a reminder of dates, and contains 
postal and other information. 
- Messrs. J. Weeks & Co., Chelsea, remind us of the coming 
year by a sample of their Horticultural Pocket Book and Diary 
for 1889, which they distribute amongst gardeners. It is in a solid 
leather case, and is strong, convenient, and useful, containing pockets 
for money and stamps, which we hope will be well furnished ; blank 
pages for notes that may be instructively occupied ; and tables of in¬ 
formation to which possessors may turn when their memories fail them. 
- Mild Weather and Slugs.—“A Lanarkshire Bee-keeper” 
writes :—“ The warm weather has been very favourable for destroying 
slugs and snails, as they were all on the surface and easily dispatched 
with a little quicklime. Underneath heaps of rubbish left for the pur¬ 
pose many were congregated, a slight dusting of lime quickly prevent¬ 
ing their doing further injury to plants and flowers.” 
- The Committee of the Chorley Chrysanthemum Society 
have fixed the date of their sixth annual Show of Chrysanthemums for 
November 22nd and 23rd, 1889. 
- At the ordinary meeting of the Boyal Meteorological 
Society to be held at 25, Great George Street, Westminster, on Wed¬ 
nesday, the 19th instant, at 7 p.m., the following papers will be read :— 
“ Note on the Prolonged Spell of Cold Weather from September, 1887, 
to October, 1888,” by Charles Harding, F.B.Met.Soc. ; “ Beport on the 
Phenological Observations for 1888,” by the Bev. T. A. Preston, M.A., 
F.B.Met.Soc. ; “ A Winter’s Weather at Massowah,” by Capt. D. Wilson- 
Barker, F.B.Met.Soc. 
- A correspondent writes :—“ The members of the Liver¬ 
pool Horticultural Association met for their annual dinner on 
Saturday, December 8th. There were about 110 members present, and 
Stanley Bogerson, Esq., Hon. Treasurer of the Society, occupied the 
chair. The meeting proved a very pleasant one. Mr. B. W. Ker re¬ 
plied to the toast, ‘ The Horticultural Trade,’ and Mr. Bardney and Mr. 
Powell, Botanic Garden, for ‘The Press.’ Mr. White, the Chairman of 
the Society, replied to the toast, ‘ The Liverpool Horticultural 
Society.’ ” 
- We have received from Messrs. Wood & Son what they modestly 
call their Note Book. It must not be understood as filled with blank 
pages on which notes can be written from time to time, but on the con¬ 
trary about ninety pages are crowded with printed cultural notes on 
various subjects, by men whose long and successful experience entitle 
them to be regarded as sound advisers. The subjects appear to have 
been well selected, and are generally ably treated, but a few faults are 
apparent in editing ; these, however, not in the least affecting the use¬ 
fulness of the pages. 
- Gardening Appointments. — Mr. C. Dawson, lately foreman 
at Ewenny Priory, Bridgend, has been engaged as gardener to Mrs. 
Saunders Davies, Cilwendeg Park, Boncath, Pembrokeshire, South 
Wales. Mr. W. Hunt, for the past five years outside foreman at Swan- 
more Park, Bishop’s Waltham, has been appointed to the charge of the 
garden of the Bev. II. E. Trotter, Arlington Vicarage, Wantage, Berks. 
Mr. E. White, for fourteen years gardener to Mr. Soames, Cranford 
Hall, Kettering, after an absence of twelve months at Bock House, 
Derby, has been reappointed gardener at Cranford Hall, under a new 
employer. 
- Tulips at the Paris Exhibition, 1889.— We are informed 
that Messrs. E. H. Krelage & Son of Haarlem, Holland, have planted in 
the Horticultural Parkof the Paris Exhibition of next year six beds each of 
225 square feet superficial with late Tulips selected from their new col¬ 
lection of breeders, consisting of upwards of seven hundred varieties. 
Messrs. Krelage are the first of foreign exhibitors whose installation is 
established. The Tulips have received a prominent position, as the beds 
are formed in the large grass plot in front of the Palace of the Trocadero 
These Tulips, flowering usually about the middle of May, are expected 
to be ready at the opening of the Exhibition, or shortly afterwards. 
