F<;t>rnary 28, 1889. J 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
'When the days get longer and the sun gains powe-, less favoured 
positions will answer better, while a little shade and frequent 
syingings are necessary in hot weather. 
When the Beans have principally to be grown on hot shelves 
and exposed benches and walls only the earliest batches should be 
grown in pots, the rest being grown in narrow boxes or planted 
out in pits and frames. Dryness at the roots, quickly leads to 
failure, and in hot weather pots well filled with roots need water¬ 
ing two or three times in a day ; whereas wood is non-conductive, 
and therefore not so soon affected by any extreme. Supposing 
strong boxes were made 3 feet long, with a clear iuside measure- 
i ment of 8 inches in depth, and the same in width, six of these 
would be equal to thirty pots, and take up less room. A single 
row of plants 6 inches apart is nil that should be grown in each 
box, and if given good room all round such thus treated will yield 
heavy and continuous crops. In boxes the Beans form clean 
vigorous growth altogether superior to those in pots. 
Kidney Beans also do well in heated pits and frames in close 
succession to early Potatoes. In the houses they are a nuisance, 
especially during April and May, and it is always a relief to be rid 
■of them ; but in pits and frames they are very little trouble. Sup¬ 
posing the earliest Potatoes are obtained from heated pits, it is 
advisable to raise a number of Beans in small pots in anticipation 
■of the clearance of three or four lights, successional batches being 
similarly prepared according as they are wanted. We raise about 
one hundred plants at a time, or enough for three lights, either 
s^gly in 2i-inch pots or in pairs in pots a size larger. From these 
they transplant readily and come into bearing very much earlier 
than would be the case if the seed were sown where the plants were 
to grow. After the newly cleared portion of the bed has been 
levelled the Beans are put out 6 inches apart in rows not less than 
15 inches apart, and are at once watered and lightly staked. Sub¬ 
sequent treatment consists of occasional applications of tepid 
water, liberal syringings once or twice on clear days, shading 
from bright sunshine, careful, but not excessive, ventilation, and 
early closing. Good crops may be had from plants in unheated 
frames towards the end of May and in June ; but if there is a 
little bottom heat they will grow more strongly and quickly. We 
also set the handlights, when taken off Cauliflowers, on a warm 
border and fill these with plants raised in pots, this being a gain of 
a fortnight or more. Those in unheated frames or rough pits 
should be well covered up every night, Kidney Beans being any- 
tiring but hardy. 
Crowding—whether in pots ; boxes, or frames—ought always to 
bo avoided. When grown thickly in pots they yield numerous 
pods at first, but soon collapse ; while if crowded where a more 
moist and unlimited root run is afforded they smother each other, 
and fail to crop satisfactorily. The pods should be kept closely 
gathered, for a twofold reason ; they soon get old and tough, and 
the longer they are left on the plant the worse it is for those 
succeeding them. The quality is much impaired by keeping, but 
if not wanted, or if the gathering is too small for a dish, they may 
be bunched-up, and set with their stalks on damp moss in a cool 
room. Partial immersion in water makes them hard, and an 
experienced cook will readily detect which have been in water and 
which have not. A few years ago Osborn’s Forcing was the best 
variety for early culture, but this is now superseded by Ne Plus 
Kltra. The latter is quite as eirly, and is preferred on account of 
its fairly vigorous yet productive habit. A good selection of Sion 
House also forces well, and this, as well as Carter’s Longsword, are 
well adapted to pit and frame culture. Many are tempted to try 
Canadian Wonder for house and frame culture, but although the 
pods are longer than the other varieties named yield they are not 
so plentifully produced, the plants also requiring much more room. 
—W. Iggulden. 
AURICULAS. 
I IIOPE to enjoy the privilege of reading a paper on the 
progress of the Auricula at the Royal Horticultural Society’s 
afternoon meeting on April 23rd, and it may save valuable space, 
if not time, if I ask my friend “ J. M.” to wait, on some points, 
for that. I hold firmly to the contrary of his latest opinions, and 
am convinced that among the newer seedlings the Auricula is giving 
us still higher types of beauty as a florist flower. I would not grow 
the new if the old were better ; still less, as the time may come, 
would I offer to my fellow florists any flower that would disgrace 
itself. As little do I harbour jealousy or spite against those few of 
the old sorts that are really good ; but I submit that they should 
rather stand surrounded by worthy compeers than by a host of 
inferiorities which it is little honour to defeat. 
“ J. M.’s” words glow with love for the Auricula ; “the bite,” 
aa he happrly expresses it, is plain upon him. As for me, that 
lb7 
“ bite ” was almost a birth-mark, in that from my childhood in the 
forties, I have known and loved the Auricula, and had it grown for 
me while yet I could not grow it myself. I have both known the 
old and watched the new ; and for more than these last twenty 
years successively, to say naught of earlier attempts necessarily 
interrupted, I have striven with the weaker properties of this 
flower. May I be pardoned for saying that I saw faults which 
“ J. M.” does not appear, even now, to see ? I could not rest 
contented with them, feeling just as sure that there were higher 
qualities attainable, as I am that there will be Auriculas better yet 
than any we may live to raise, if so be that “ the bite ” become not 
a lost forgotten taste. 
“ J. M.,” I think, writes without full sight or knowledge of 
the later English seedlings. Certainly there is much he cannot 
know, for we have only seen it in visits among ourselves. I speak 
from this knowledge also, and before the work of English raisers 
deserves branding with the burning words “heresy” and “im¬ 
posture,” I think it would be well to see how far such a judgment 
is warranted by fact. 
By way of illustration, I would like to show my friend “ Ebony ” 
against Sim’s Vulcan or any other old black ; “Melaine” against 
Pizarro, Blackbird, or any old type of that colour ; or “ Mrs. Potts,” 
in whose blue veins, by the way, there was the blood of Heroine, 
against all old blues, or Heroine herself against any of the amiable 
old plums, say Martin’s Eclipse. 
But even Heroine has not yet been seen in the far north as 
Heroine is. The trusses were shown far too crowded with pips, 
and the colour spoiled. Heroine will carry twelve with power and 
accuracy, but not the twoscore or more with which she generally, 
on an up-grown plant, attempts to bloom. However, she will be 
better handled as she comes to be better understood. I will not go 
further than that I should like “ J. M.” to see “ Magpie ” or 
“ Miranda ” against any old white edges; and I wish, in short, 
that he could see the English seedlings in their round of bloom at 
home. 
It is both charm and pity that the Auricula cannot be made as 
easily distributable as the Carnation, Pansy, or Chrysanthemum ; 
but if I had to make a collection now I would not begin on 
“ J. M.’s” lines. I would only get two of the best flowers pro¬ 
curable in each class, and all the rest should be seedlings of the 
most careful crosses I could make. Putting his hand to the plough 
with these few chosen heifers “ J. M.” would be astonished to see 
how soon he would be abreast of most of the old varieties. He 
might secure a gem of brilliance beyond its day, but I would not 
lure him to over-confidence, and may say that such flowers as have 
come to me in Heroine, Ebony, Melaine (seifs), Magpie, Miranda, 
Elaine (white-edged), Greyhound, Grayling, Atalanta (grey), and 
Dragon-fly, Monarch, and some seedlings from my namesake (green 
edged) are among the results of long years, and so to say, are only 
distantly connected with their first parents. 
Taking the seifs for an example, I never keep one with a 
notched petal or that does not remain in good form from first to 
last, or that has not a perfectly broad and circular paste or a rich 
velvety surface and solid body colour. Against these properties 
where are the frilled and crumpled petals of Sims’ Vulcan, the 
narrow paste and reflexing pips of Othello, the scollopped wavy 
paste of Blackbird, the thin “blanket” paste of Lord Lome, and 
his rough-edged tube, the notched petal of Argyll, the thin substance 
of Eclipse, the comparatively dull colours of Mrs. Sturrock and 
Meteor Flag ? Properties of tube are higher than they used 
to be, the most difficult to improve being the “ blues ” in this 
respect. Sapphire, an early effort is pale and poor in this, and 
Mrs. Potts, with a clear lemon, is the best new blue so far as I 
have seen. 
But “ J. M.” charges us with recommending only such 
Auriculas, old and new, as are “ up to our standard.” What is our 
standard but that of the Auricula herself, in herself declared, and 
by herself developed ? Is a pale tube better than a gold one ? Is 
a notched or pointed petal superior to a broad and rounded one ? 
Is a rough or narrow paste a truer beauty than the open generous 
eye of one which is round and dense and broad ? Are thin un- 
steadfast colours in the seifs and a ground tint changeable and 
running out at edge in green or grey or white edged flowers 
higher than constancy and proportion in these properties ? If so 
be, then are nearly all the old better than the cream of all the new, 
and “ our standard ” an erring one. 
I believe many brother florists in the north of England and the 
south will sustain me in this, That we are not multiplying florist 
“heresy,” but gaining orthodox fioiist improvement. It is but 
natural that it should be so ever more and more. So, with a 
reverence for all that is old and good, and a welcome to all that is 
good and new, I must pass onward from my friend, “ J. M.,” self 
“ shunted ” on his little “ siding,” and hasten on, far as I may, 
