38 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ January 17,1»80. 
them sturdy, and not on an open lattice stage over highly heated 
hot-water pipes. Dry air abstracts the moisture from the leaves, 
and this is fatal to free growth. 
Then insects have to be considered. They should not be allowed, 
because if there are a few to be seen there will be many others 
unseen, and the plants will have already suffered, and will suffer 
more, and be seriously checked before the enemy is exterminated. 
The best Cyclamen growers do not kill insects, but prevent their 
appearance by periodical light fumigations. This plan is not only 
effectual, but more economical than waiting till the insects come, 
then having to burn thrice the tobacco or tobacco paper for destroying 
them. If the prevention method were generally adopted by culti¬ 
vators there would be fewer failures with Cyclamens and many 
other plants. It is by proceeding on the lines indicated, taking 
every step thoughtfully, and working intelligently, that Primulas 
and Cyclamens are grown as they should be, and as they are pro¬ 
duced in the best plant-growing establishments. Nowhere, perhaps, 
are these beautiful winter flowers better represented than at Reading 
by Messrs. Sutton & Sons, and whoever visits their collection now 
will not be disappointed. The plants are in thousands, and every 
one will bear critical inspection. It is a question for individuals to 
settle as to which they admire most—the excellence of the varieties 
or the splendid culture of the plants. 
Since all the forms are so good it is almost invidious to par¬ 
ticularise, but the pair of Giant Primulas—new crimson and pure 
white—command attention. The first named is exceedingly rich, 
large, and -of great substance, later in flowering than many others, 
and a midwinter and spring acquisition. Of early varieties for 
autumn and winter, Snowdrift, Reading Scarlet, Reading Pink, 
Double Carmine, and Carnation flaked are noteworthy, with others 
of equal merit to follow. The blue Primula is in addition to the 
type represented in the Fern-leaveu form, single, also with double 
flowers ; and doubles of all other colours are plentiful and all 
raised from seed ; the newest of these, the Double White Fern¬ 
leaved, much resembles in the character of its flowers those of the 
old Double White Primula that is raised from cuttings and will be 
used for the same purpose. It i3 not necessary, however, to 
continue the enumeration, for the different varieties are accurately 
described in the catalogue of the firm, and the collection is superb. 
As to the Cyclamens, it is only the simple truth to say they equal 
the Primulas. In purity the White Butterfly is unsurpassed, and 
in richness Vulcan bears the palm ; its flowers are, however, not 
quite so large as those of the Giant White, Rose, Crimson, and 
Purple varieties, those of the first-named measuring 4 inches 
across the expanded segments. It is both pleasant and instructive 
to inspect collections of flowers where merit and culture are so 
admirably blended, as hints are derivable therefrom that may be 
of general service, and may do something to enable others to 
achieve the success they desire in growing the favourite plants 
under notice better than before, and as they should be presented 
for giving satisfaction to all who know when work is well done in 
cultivation.— Ax Oi.n Grower. 
CIDER. 
Your genial editorial note on Mr. Raillem’s amusing chit-chat 
ytaper in a recent issue encourages me to hope that you will still 
condescend to open the pages of our Journal to a few more lines 
of not altogether uninteresting gossip on the subject of our once 
national beverage, cider. With this seasonable weather it is easy 
to delude oneself into the idea that Christmas time is not quite come 
and gone. 
Like your Suffolk and Somersetshire correspondents I must say, 
writing as a Herefordshire man, that I too, until last year, was 
quite unaware that East Anglia, to wit Norfolk and Suffolk, laid 
claim to be included among the cider counties of England. How 
I became disillusioned was as follows. A friend who takes a great 
interest in these matters, and who, I may add, manufactures cider 
for the public in the usual amateur fashion, happened when on a 
visit to ask me whether I had noticed a certain stall devoted to 
bottled cider made at B—— in Norfolk, at one of the large London 
exhibitions last year. On my answering that I had not been to any 
of them, he went on to say that he had learnt several facts from 
the person in charge which would have startled him had he not 
remembered that wise men came from the East. Among other 
things he was informed that more cider was made in the East than 
in the West of England, and that his particular firm manufactured 
their cider exclusively from the far famed Ribston Pippin. Happy, 
thrice happy, the men, thought I, who possess sufficient trees of this 
exquisite variety to make their entire annual brew for the public ! 
But is it the case that our best table fruit makes the best cider, 
even if it could be got in sufficient quantity ? All our pomological 
writers of all epochs agree in stating they do not. Mind, I am quite 
aware that very early cider was made of Pippins or Harvest Apples, 
but then, like the Apples themselves, the cider would not keep, was 
drunk directly, and seldom if ever bottled. 
In the West Midlands the normal cider Apple is small, tough 
skinned, and usually a bitter-sweet, seldom pleasant to the eye or 
good for food ; but still I must candidly confess that I have heard 
of a cider being made of Golden Harvey (Brandy Apple) almost 
unique for flavour and strength, but it took over fifty bushels to make 
the hogshead (100 gallons', and a cider-making farmer, whose word I 
can quite rely on, told me that he made his best cask of cider for 
the year from Blenheim Pippin Apples. Mr. Raillem s amusing 
story of the Lancashire man in Cornwall is in itself a striking 
testimonial to the most valuable characteristic in cider viz., its 
low alcoholic strength. I have lived all my life among agricul¬ 
tural labourers, and can honestly say that I have never seen a work¬ 
man off his head or legs from drinking cider only, although to 
instance the quantity that can be drunk there is in this parish a 
man, the champion cider drinker of the district, who beat all pre¬ 
vious records by drinking in all sobriety five gallons of cider in one 
long harvest day. But only let John Hodge be sent to market to 
fetch home some live stock, and the chances are that the man gels 
fuddled with a small quantity of beer, and returns home a lower 
stamp of beast than the one he drives. _ 
But enough about quantity. I am not sticking up for the 
extremely acid cider the labourer usually drinks and by habit 
enjoys. Very well do I remember getting a cask of old cider out 
of my cellar in which a vinegar plant had been long luxuriating, 
with a view to consigning its contents to the nearest drain, when 
my man protested in the following terms :—“ Wa al ! It be a bit 
< bould,’ surely ; but if I could get it down I believe it would do me 
good.” It would be far better if the men had less cider in quantity 
and the farmers made it better in quality ; but there s the rub ! 
Custom dies hard, and never harder than with cider as commonly, 
that is, unintelligently made. But what need of this extremely 
acid stage being reached ? I do not believe in the. stories of 
horrible things being put into cider to fine it ; certainly not by 
farmers who are cider sellers, and of Bristol and other cider 
merchants' practices I know absolutely nothing ; but raw meat 
sounds to me an absurdity, for surely the acid of the cider, unless 
it has undergone bactric or putric fermentation, would tend to pre¬ 
serve, not destroy, such animal substances. With a little more care 
in racking the cider when it precipated its ferments and thick 
particles—i.e., fined itself with or without help in the shape of 
albumens from the cider maker, and the exclusion directly after¬ 
wards of all atmospheric air by bunging up the cask, a very 
different beverage would be produced, and sufficient de-alcoliolised 
sugar be left in the cider to wipe away the reproach of extreme 
acfdity the beverage at present justly deserves ; 
Now, having described cider after a gossiping fashion, as the 
public know it, all over our cider counties in the west and east of 
England, and I believe, from what I hear, in Normandy and 
Brittany, I will conclude my already too lengthy remarks by the 
description of the experience I gained in a visit about three weeks 
ago to a recently erected cider factory in Hereford. Through the 
courtesy of the enterprising young manager, Mr. H. P. Bulmer, I 
was allowed to go over the buildings and cellars while in full work¬ 
ing order ; and although I was fully prepared to find both the 
cider and perry of the highest excellence, from the fact of the firm 
lately winning both the premier silver-gilt and golden medals at the 
International Exhibition now being held at Paris, I was agreeably 
surprised with the even, good quality of the cider and perry 
throughout the cellars. I was much struck, too, by the almost 
entire departure from old methods and great saving of labour in 
the introduction of suitable machinery. 
Though this is, throughout all England, an unusually scarce yer r 
for fruit, I was informed that upwards of 10,000 dozen of cider 
and perry are to be bottled in the spring—incomparably, I should 
imagine, the largest stock this year in the hands of any single firm ; 
whife as I tasted cask after cask of even sweetness in bright ar.d 
delicious condition the words of a friend, an authority on all 
country matters, occurred to me : “ The majority of people have 
very erroneous ideas about cider. They think it a coarse acid 
