258 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
( Slarcli iO, 1888 
Peaches begin colonring. After the fruits are set I fumigate twice, then 
syringe twice daily until ripening commences. I give a mulching in 
April of horse droppings and leaves, ■which is a great help in keeping the 
border moist. As a rule, every year I have three times as many Peaches 
to take off as I lea 'e on ; in fact, one year I took off three hundred 
and then left a heavy crop. My Peaches at the present time are nearly as 
large as marbles, and more than half will be taken off. The tem¬ 
perature will be kept from 58° to 60° at night until they have stoned, 
after that 6° higher with fire heat will not hurt when the trees are kept 
syringed t-wice daily until ripening commences. 
After the crop is gathered I prune the trees at once, as I believe in 
having the wood as ripe as possible. I think pruning the trees greatly 
assists in ripening it, by admitting the sun and air among the foliage ; 
the stems are untied, the top and front ventilators and door being 
thrown open. The trees are thoroughly drenched about 5 p.M. every 
evening with the garden engine, and twice a week a wineglassful of 
petroleum is .added to each four gallons of water to make sure work of 
red spider. The border has its usual 240 gallons every four weeks until 
the leaves fall, then the trees are left to rest until the house is cleaned 
and clo.sed for another season. I may also state I like a space of 
4 inches between the shoots. How often we see Peach trees trained as 
thickly as possible, which I consider is a great mistake.—G. Clinging, 
3[ardcn Park. 
- A SPECIAL general meeting of the Koyal Horticultural 
SociETi' will be held in the Council Room, No. Ill, Victoria Street, S.W., 
on Tuesday the 10th of April, to take into consideration a code of new 
by-laws submitted by the Council for the future management of the 
Society. 
- Ghent E.nhibition. —Mr. Henry Pearson writes—“ I have 
been in communication with the Manager of L. C. -A D. R. Co. respect¬ 
ing the above, and have proposed to him the issuing of cheap circular 
tickets to enable horticulturists who wish to do so, to visit the bulb 
grounds of Holland after the Exhibition. He writes ‘that his company 
hope to issue through tickets at a good reduction, fuller particulars will 
b? given later on.' ” 
- Gardeners' Royal Benevolent Institution.— Mr. E. P. 
Citler writes :—“ I have the pleasure to inform you that the late Lord 
Northwick has, by his will, left a legacy of £100, free of duty, to this 
Institution, also that the Right Hon. Joseph Chamberlain, M.P., has 
appointed Wedne.sday, the 4th .July next, for the anniversary dinner of 
the Institution, upon which occasion he will take the chair.’’ 
- The We.vther.—“ D. B.” writing from Scotland, remarks 
that, “ The week ending 26th has been very variable and unpleasant. 
Generally cold E. and N.E. winds have prevailed, with occasional milder 
intervals. A rapid thaw on the 21st removed a great deal of the snow 
■n'here not drifted. Frosts of 7° and 8° took place at the beginning of 
the week. .V fall of snow hast evening (25th) follovved by 11° of frost 
makes everything as wintry looking as ever.” 
- Mr. W. IVenman, The Gardens, Hickleton Hall, Doncaster, 
writes :—” I’hc weather still keeps very severe. Here in this p,art of York¬ 
shire we h.ad 11° of frost on Saturday the 24th. On the 25th we had a 
f.ill of snow several inches deep, and on Monday we had 9° of frost. 
It will be a very late spring if we do not soon have more genial weather. 
Seed-sowing is at a standstill here.” The weather in the south has been 
simewhat milder, but there has been much cold rain and a little snow. 
The .soil is still in a very unfavourable condition for working or seed- 
sowing. 
- The Gardeners’ Orphan Fund.—"T he monthly meeting of 
the Committee was held on Friday night last. Present—Mr. G. Deal 
(Chairman), and Messrs. Barron, Bates, Cannell, Dean, Herbst, Laing, 
Roberts. Roupell, "Wright, and Wynne, with Mr. G. Cummins, one of the 
provincial Secretaries. Since the last meeting the sum of £26 Is. 6d. 
has been received in donations, and £19 5s. as subscriptions, the number 
of new contributors being scvent 3 ^-four. A total of £150.3 3s. has been 
promised in the form of donations and subscriptions, of which £1192 10s. 
have been receiveik All amounts due should be transmitted to Mr. 
Barron at Chiswick as early as convenient, as it is desired to place as 
many candidates as possible on the fund at the first annual meeting. 
This will take place at t'W'o o’clock on Friday, July 13th, at the Cannon 
Street Hotel, to be follo'wed by a dinner at five o’clock, at which the 
President, Sir Julian Goldsmid, Bart., M.P., is expected to be present. 
Thii promises to be the great gathering of gardeners and horticul¬ 
turists of the year, the room engaged being capable of accommodating 
about 500 persons. Further particulars relating to the event will be 
published. The following special Committees were .appointed to take 
charge of the arrangements :—1, Decorationa — Flowers, Messrs. Herbst, 
Bates, and Head. 2, Pe.ssert —Fruit, Messrs. Roberts, Wright, and 
Laing. 3, Music, Messrs. Deal, Richards, and Turner. 4, 'lickct.’i, 
Messrs. Richards, Wright, and Wynne. 5, Election, Messrs. Deal, 
Roupell, and Dean. Samples of collecting boxes were examined, and a 
gross ordered for distribution. There are many applicants for these, 
and others can be sent to Mr. Barron. A complete list of subscribers 
was ordered to be printed. The position and prospects of the 1' und are 
considered highly satisfactory, and the greater the support accorded the 
more extended will be the benefits to the orphan children of gardeners 
nominated for election. 
- Literary Immorality. —It has come to our knowledge that 
a contributor to the gardening press is in the habit of applying to 
vendors of garden requisites offering, for a consideration, to commend 
their wares (that he has not tried) in articles that he hopes to get 
inserted. The responsible heads of firms of high repute would scorn to 
be parties to such literary immorality, and we sliall not allow any 
articles to appear in our columns from the writer in question. He is 
not, we believe, on the staff of any of the gardening papers, though he 
has contributed to some of them, and very occasionally, though not very 
recently, to this Journal; but he is now informed that no matter what 
he may send us in the future it will be rejected. 
- Messrs. Sutton & Sons send us a Cineraria bloom so far above 
the average of the hundreds that reach us as to be worthy of mention. 
It was grown by Mr. T. Crosswell, gardener to W. M. Bullivant, Esq., 
Eden Park, Beckenham. It exceeds 3 inches in diameter, is perfectly 
circular, the florets, of which there is a double row, overlapping to their 
extremities, and several of them are three-quarters of an inch in 
diameter. The colour is purplish crimson with a white centre, this how¬ 
ever breaking into the colour a trifle, and in that detracting from the 
perfectness of the bloom. We are ■willing to notice any blooms equal or 
superior to this as encouragement to the raisers and growers, whoever 
they may be, and as an incentive to others to surpass them. 
- Tomatoes as Border Plants. - “ J. G.” writes —“ In June 
last year I planted a border of my garden at St. Albans with twelve 
Tomato plants, a large red ■smriety, from one of which I cut 20 lbs. 
weight of excellent fruit. I bestowed very little care on these plants 
beyond supporting them with stout stakes, and top-dressing them when 
they had set their fruit with Thomson’s plant manure. Apart from the 
value of the crop, the plants presented a splendid appearance, loaded 
as they were with ripe fruit.” 
- British Ferns. —At a recent meeting of the AVakefield Paxton 
Society, Councillor Milnes, the newly elected President, was in the 
chair, Mr. H. Oxley occupied the vice-chair, and there was a good 
attendance of the members. Mr. T. Garnett, who has been appointed 
co-Secretary with Mr. G. W. Fallas, in the room of Mr. Herbert Chap¬ 
man, resigned, read the minutes of the annual meeting held on the pre¬ 
vious Saturday, and they were adopted. The President also mentioned 
that at a meeting of the Committee on the previous Wednesday evening 
it was unanimously resolved to present a student’s microscope to Mr. 
Herbert Chapman as a slight recognition of his valuable services as one 
of the Honorary Secretaries for the past six years. Mr. Ij. Twigge, 
nurseryman, St. John’s, read a very interesting paper on “Ferns and 
their U.ses.” About a quarter of a century ago Mr. Twigge, whilst re¬ 
siding m Derbyshire, collected and preserved about 800 specimens of 
British and Exotic Ferns, and he exhibited some of his specimens, and 
also a couple of pretty little baskets filled with young and healthy 
Ferns. Mr. Twigge said that August and September are the best 
times for collectors of Ferns to gather specimens for preserving, and 
they might be preserved between newspapers as well as by the use of 
blotting paper. Ferns stand unrivalled as pot plants, and as decorative 
plants they have no equal. Cut Ferns are now very extensively used in 
this country, and shiploads of them are sent to England every week 
