583 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ December 27, 1888. 
Beyond the demand, so long will wages be low. This is the grand 
secret, if secret it be, why gardeners in many instances are not better 
p*.id than the “ powdered ” gentlemen to be found “ standing at ease,” 
or awfully busy doing nothing, in so many of the establishments in 
'this country. 
It has been well indicated by Mr. Ruskin, and other eminent 
writers, that there is probably no nobler task for human enterprise in 
the present day than that which is to be found in the great pioneer work 
of colonisation—the leading forth of the surplus thousands of the Old 
'World to people the vast solitudes of the New, and the removal, as far 
■as possible, of the rude natural obstacles which lie in their path to the 
establishment of happy homes and civilised conditions, such as their 
more favoured or more fortunate fellow-countrymen enjoy at home. It 
ds being more and more recognised that this is not a work in which only 
Colonial Governments can render effective service, but one in which the 
strong incentives to individual genius, energy, and enterprise which may 
be afforded to the private capitalist, and the best organising and pioneer¬ 
ing abilities that can be induced to engage in it should not be wanting. 
One remedy for the congested state of affairs in the gardening labour 
market would appear to be emigration. I know it will be urged that 
gardening as a profession is not overstocked with really good men, and 
that England will never have a surplus of masters of gardening, or with 
men who are capable of system and economy in the management of 
land, such as Gilbert, Douglas, Wildsmith, Roberts, Bedford, Coleman, 
Sampson, the Thompsons, and many others. But to my question. I 
Rave lately had a conversation with a gentleman well known in the 
horticultural world, who has spent a good many years in our colonies. 
It is twenty years since he left the colonies. At that time he states 
there were a good many wealthy gentlemen who had extensive gardens 
that required special attention. With the rapid growth of wealth in 
them this number must have largely increased, and the demand for 
gardeners must have grown in proportion. As to wages, these are in¬ 
variably high compared to the sums paid in England. As to the suita¬ 
bility of the English gardener for the Colonies, it depends so much on 
the man and his special knowledge, together with his willingness to work 
— the latter a most essential condition to success. Gardeners and their 
abilities vary. The landscape or pleasure gardener, the fruit grower, 
and the market gardener are each of a different class, but there is 
invariably room for the two latter while the demand for the former is 
limited. In this gent'eman’s colonial days a gardener who was a good 
all-round man did not mind looking after a horse, while his wife would 
handle the family cow, turn out a decent bit of butter, and tend the 
fowls—wages £100 a year, with house and rations ; and if they had two 
or three children that did not matter much. These were not looked 
upon, as at home, as encumbrances ! They were all found in plenty of 
food—this has reference to Australia. Sir Charles Dilke, in his able 
work “ Greater Britain,” says with time and care Australia ought to be 
the vineyard of the world, and our neighbour, Mr. D. Morris, the assist¬ 
ant-director of the Royal Gardens, Kew, has written : “ From these 
sunny lands, Where our sons and daughters have made their homes, we 
■shall draw our future supply of fruit, in quality and quantity probably 
exceeding that of any fruit industry the world has seen.” 
Having so far disposed of one remedy, I proceed briefly to consider 
the second. The great want of the present day seems to be a national 
and comprehensive School of Horticulture, in which we could train 
really competent men ; men who, in the fulness of time, will adorn and 
not disgrace the profession. This is indeed a large subject. I can only 
wdthin the limits of such a paper as this touch the question. Such a 
school should issue certificates of competency, granted by well-known 
thoroughly qualified and practical men to the candidates, and if 
■employers really had at heart the best interests of horticulture they 
would only engage for their service such men as have passed successfully 
through the trying ordeal. The certificate from the National School of 
Horticulture should be the hall mark of merit; the “ badge of honour ” 
by which every gardener should be recognised and respected. This 
would indeed be carrying out the Darwinian maxim of the survival of 
the fittest. Perhaps a great—the great evil—of one of our present 
courses of procedure is the apprentice system (at best a bad system), 
particularly as it affects those serving short terms. At the end of the 
brief period of their apprenticeship, by the influence of their master, 
they obtain a situation in some garden, where, thoroughly ignorant of 
the very rudiments of their trade, they are a disgrace to themselves and 
often an annoyance to others, besides occupying the room of somebody 
who has obtained a good knowledge of his business, and through the 
avarice of some individual is supplanted by an ignoramus who can dig, 
rake, and hoe, and there his abilities stop. 
Perhaps I have drawn a somewhat gloomy picture of the gardener’s 
position in this country. There is, however, one bright speck in the 
horticultural sky ; may it grow larger and larger, and illumine by its 
welcome radiance the heart of many a struggling blue apron. Fruit 
culture, gardening in the fields in this country, is coming to the front. 
With a reform in our land laws there is indeed a bright ray of hope for 
the gardener here. No doubt in the good time coming there will be a 
considerable extension of both fruit growing and market gardening in 
many parts of the country, which will create much employment for the 
cultivators of the soil. To sum up—there is evolution in horticulture 
as in all other things, and the gardener must change with the times, or 
give up his gardening and try something else. He must fit himself and 
do his best to meet the wishes of his employer, even to the sacrifice of a 
few of his own ideas and notions. Success in life, so far as a gentle¬ 
man's gardener is concerned, is as much due to his ability in a social 
sense as to his skill in land culture, or in plant or fruit-growing. There 
is nowadays a growing desire to make land—gardens included—more 
profitable ; and a new race of gardeners who will devote themselves to 
the solving of this problem will be bound to succeed. Some^ people say 
fruit culture will do it, but the same result will be gained in different 
ways in different places, and to find out some way of making land 
profitable is well within the gardener’s province. His capital and skill 
may either be focussed under glass, or it may be more widely spread 
over a garden farm, but it is che gardener’s business to do his best 
towards making his native land fruitful and profitable. 
ASTER COMET. 
During the present year we have seen several remarkably fine ex¬ 
amples of this distinct and beautiful Aster, and we were much impressed 
with a stand of blooms at one of the autumn exhibitions. It has been 
FIU. 67.—ASTER COMET. 
aptly compared to a Japanese Chrysanthemum with long flat florets 
slightly curling at the tips, but in colouring it is quite unique, white 
striped with bright pink, the latter colour being principally confined to 
the margins of the florets, somewhat in the style of Belle Paule 
Japanese Chrysanthemum. The illustration (fig. 67), for which we are 
indebted to Messrs. Sutton & Sons of Reading, appears in the issue of 
the above firm’s “ Amateurs’ Guide in Horticulture ” for 1889, an elegant 
and useful production, showing this year a still further improvement on 
previous efforts. The Aster as represented is tall but compact in habit, 
with large blooms terminating nearly every shoot. 
CIDER. 
A correspondent writing from Suffolk asks whether cider is 
an old drink or not, and if we can tell him how long it has been in 
regular consumption, adding that it is not made and seldom seen 
in the eastern counties. In searching for information on the sub¬ 
ject we came across the following notes on “ Cider and Cider 
Orchards in the Olden Time,” which may, perhaps, interest others 
besides our East Anglian inquirer :—- 
Cider is now grown, to use a common expression, in great quan¬ 
tities in what is known as the cider country or cider counties. There 
the great part, of the population drink nothing else. Devonshire, 
