144 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ February 23, 1888. 
certain if its garden is not made a producer of revenue to the 
greatest extent possible, that Chiswick must go sooner or later- 
Can there be a desire for this ? Nothing but the success of 
the new venture can prevent the famous old garden being starved 
into inanition. Chiswick, with all its traditions, its present fine, if 
not unequalled, collection of fruits, and resources for future useful¬ 
ness at a time when, if utilised, they would be of national benefit— 
Must it perish ? and the Royal Horticultural Society be thereby 
deprived of the honour of teaching the w%ay, as suggested by Dr. 
Masters in a pregnant sentence at the meeting, of showing how the 
land in England, now depreciating in value, can be profitably 
cultivated ? That can be shown undoubtedly, if scope be afforded 
and means provided for conducting cultural experiments on a 
commercial basis to their final issue ; and what is more, no other 
garden in the kindom could carry out the work, most important 
and most honourable, so well. There is no doubt the Committee 
desire to see Chiswick flourish, and the only way in which means 
can be afforded is by making the expenditure remunerative, gaining 
a continuous stream of supporters, and turning the productive 
power of the garden to substantial account. 
I WAS glad to read your leading article (page 121) on the R.H.S. 
Do anything rather than let Chiswick go. Everybody trades nowa¬ 
days, and if labour is honourable trade is also honourable. Sell to 
anybody if Chiswick can be preserved. The loss of Chiswick, as I 
take it, will be the end of the Society. I sometimes think that in 
gardening, as in many other arts and sciences, the better the trade 
returns the better the science. Horticulture must get rid of its 
diletantteism, and, like the proverbial tub, stand on its own 
bottom. Take Veitch’s nursery as an example, managed more 
scientifically, and doing better! scientific work than half the so. 
called experimental and botanical gardens in Europe, and moreover 
paying its way. In a word a scientific success is, or ought to be, a 
practical or pecuniary success as well,’ and in the cases above 
quoted it really is so. My aphorism is, I feel sure, correct—viz., 
that our future farming will be gardening in the fields. A focus of' 
power on smaller areas, glass protected or otherwise, must supplant 
the rude or rough-and-ready culture now scotched and often 
strangled by foreign competition. The struggle of the future will 
not be with brute force, but in organisation and brain power of the 
finest and best.—F. W. B. 
EUCHARIS CULTURE. 
I SHOULD like to say a few words about Eucharis culture. When 
I took charge of these gardens about eight years ago the Eucharises 
were in a very bad condition—indeed, I found about a dozen 
8-inch pots filled with bulbs with scarcely any leaves, and these 
were only a few inches long—spotted, w-rinkled, broken, and un¬ 
healthy. The soil was very wet and sour, with plenty of little 
mites all round and in the bulbs that I thought were this dreadful 
Eucharis mite, but a few experiments proved to my satisfaction 
that they were not, but only a small white mite living on the 
deca 3 dng matter on and near the bulbs. 
Like “ M. D.” w-e washed, sorted, and placed all the healthiest- 
looking bulbs in pots to suit the different sizes, in about the same 
cornpost as recommended by Mr. Pettigrew, and placed them in 
their old position—an open, wooden, tressle-work stage near the 
glass in a span-roof house, where the temperature very often stands 
about 60°, and in very hard weather as low as 45°. After potting 
they had no water for a long time. The place being cool they did 
not start to gi-ow until well on in the summer, but with plenty of 
sun heat and keeping the atmosphere as moist as possible they 
started at first slowly, but they gradually gained strength, and 
■vvhen weU started we began to supply water very carefully, simply 
giving enough to moisten the soil. The same treatment was followed 
all that year, never syringing the plants, but keeping the stage 
and outside of the pots syringed as often as we could to supply the 
moisture about them that we know they like. These plants have 
grown a,nd been potted as they required it, always giving them the 
same kind of soil, and only varying the treatment when in full 
growth. By giving more water and occasional supplies of liquid 
manure we encouraged them to make a good growffh, and gradu¬ 
ally decreased the supply as they seemed to stop gi-owing, or until 
they were well ripened. Now we have a dozen plants from 3 feet 
to 4 feet 0 inches across, with plenty of the leaves, our best plant 
in a 15-inch pot measuring 3 feet in diameter. They flower regu¬ 
larly three and four times a year ; the last time, during October 
and November, we gathered 350 blooms, and once before we 
gathered over GOO in one month, and all under the dry system that 
Mr. Pettigrew condemns. No doubt with a large house, the plants- 
plunged, and with plenty of heat, light, and air, they will stand 
more water and do well, but if we were to ■water ours as Mr. Petti¬ 
grew recommends we should certainly kill them. ]\Iy advice 
to all that have or try to grow Eucharises with only a limited 
supply of heat is keep them moderately dry, only gi’ving them 
enough to keep the leaves fresh and prevent much limpness during 
the cold part of the year, and just enough when growing to 
encourage them to finish or ripen it well. I am of the same opiniora 
as “ M. D.,” that it is far better to err in giving too little than too 
much water. 
Perhaps Mr. Pettigrew will kindly tell us w'iiat heat suits. 
Eucharises best, or rather what temperature his plants are grown 
in, and whether they are plunged or not, and if plunged the heat of 
the bed, and of what it is composed. I am inclined to think from 
the quantity of water they receive that they are not plunged, but 
in a dry position near the glass or over hot pipes.—A. Haggaut. 
APRICOTS AND PLUMS. 
I FIND these fruits do well under the same general treatment, 
the latter when grown on a waU being a most important dessert- 
fruit, and well repaying any extra attention that may be bestowed 
upon the trees. No sorts I have had experience with are superior 
to the old Green Gage, Jefferson, and Coe’s Golden Drop. 
As to the best Apricots, I suppose we cannot pass the Moorpark: 
so far as flavour is concerned, but its very slow habit of gi-o-wth and 
incurable disease makes us hesitate to grow it as much as the high 
quality of its fruit would otherwise induce us to do. Shipley L 
find to be a very good substitute ; the flavour is excellent, the fruit 
of good size, and the tree fills up wall space rapidly. For preserv¬ 
ing and kitchen purposes the Royal is a good strong-growing, free- 
bearing, healthy variety, and very reliable. In order to keep a- 
supply of healthy young trees I have been in the habit of buying- 
in a few every second year, placing them about on any open portion 
of those walls having a southern exposure. I invariably select trees 
one year from the bud, and procure them from the nursery as- 
early in the season as possible. 
Apricots as a rule differ from Plums in the maiden stage, inas¬ 
much as the former have made a shorter sturdier growffh, often with a. 
few young shoots springing up the lower portion of the stem. Plums, 
if they have broken into side shoots, generally do so towards the 
upper portion of the season’s growth. Consequently at this staga 
the method of pruning is somewhat different. Plums requiring to be- 
cut back to within a foot of the stock, or if weakly somewhat 
closer. Apricots, on the other hand, may simply have a portion of 
the top cut off, at the same time thinning the side shoots, so as 
to have only sufficient to lay in not tDo closely. If a neat-fashioned 
tree is wanted, then the growth must be cut back in the same way 
as recommended for Plums. The beginning of February is a good, 
time to prune. The after treatment of the shoots in both cases is 
the same. Superfluous buds should be rubbed off, and only those 
required to form the base of the tree allowed to grow. I do not 
find it necessary to pinch strong growffhs in order to make the 
different parts of the tree balance, for if allowed to gi’ow freely 
these strong shoots will throw out plenty of smaller side growths, 
which must be thinned and laid in as needed. All the pruning the 
trees need should be done while the trees are in foliage, and by 
September it is quite possible to see what is required to be cut out 
or shortened. The treatment of after years consists in merely 
allowing a sufficient number of shoots to grow, so that the wall 
may be rapidly covered without in any way overcrowding them. 
Allow at least G inches between the growths. The young trees 
must be transplanted the second year into their permanent quarters, 
and may safely be lifted in October, or even earlier if the soil is ini 
good condition. 
The method of pruning I find does best here is that which 
makes a supply of healthy fruit-bearing spurs, and these not 
crowded. For years we have had to thin both Plums and Apricots 
to a very great extent, the spurs, as a rule, being clustered with 
fruit, and as not more than two fruits are allowed to remain to the 
spur, and often only one, the amount of thinning which has to be 
undertaken is no slight labour ; but it pays, as the fruit is so much 
better both as to size and quality, and the next year’s crop is not 
prejudiced by overtaxing the trees to forward that of the current 
year. Of Plums we have some very aged trees, but these do not 
pay so well as younger stocks, which if not bearing more freely at 
least produce^finer fruits. 
