88 
[ February 3,1887. 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
sometimes are when standing without any support. As soon as the 
plants commence growing freely, blooms will appear, after which 
they will never be without flowers. No matter what the weather 
be, nothing seems to affect them. They flower quite as well in wet 
as dry weather, and late in the autumn, when Pelargoniums are 
long past their best, continuing in flower until the end of October, 
provided a severe frost does not injure them.—E. Molyneux. 
GRAPES SHRIVELLING. 
Referring to the correspondence in your Journal concerning the 
shrivelling of Grapes this season. My view of the shrivelling process 
has been that it is an effort of the plant to concentrate the juices of the 
Grape to the density necessary for its preservation and keeping, and 
that the deficiency of density in the contents of the berry may arise 
from varied causes. In the past season continued moisture acting on 
the roots and foliage during the rainy and damp weather in August and 
part of September caused the berries to he filled with a less concen¬ 
trated solution of the salts, which are ultimately converted into cane 
sugar. Unless this solution were sufficiently concentrated fermentation 
would be set up and the berries decay rapidly. This is stopped by lessen¬ 
ing the amount of water in the berries, probably by setting up a minor 
fermentation, which causes an elimination or absorption of part of the 
water, which is stopped as soon as the proper concentration is arrived at. 
As regards a cure for such, no one can foresee a damp and moist 
season at the particular time the berries are about swelling to their 
full size. It can only be dealt with when it arrives by immediately 
covering the border with galvanised iron sheets, withholding almost all 
moisture inside the house, and raising and keeping constantly raised the 
temperature by your hot-water pipes, and giving plenty of air. This 
must be done early before the berries are saturated with excess of 
moisture. I can see other varied causes that will produce the same diluted 
state of the juices of the berries, from which, I think, the shrivelling 
proceeds. Those causes are as follows, any of which, or two or more 
jointly operating, may cause it—viz., deficiency of sunlight after the 
berries are fully swelled—ergo, insufficient formation of the salts from 
which the cane sugar is ultimately formed, likewise deficient foliage to 
properly transform the salts. A border deficient in the necessary salts, 
this latter often results in the development of only such fruit as the 
debilitated state of the plant can finish, the compensating law in Nature 
thus preventing the result. Any sudden check to the plant after the 
berries fully swelled. I shall not trouble you with other causes. I con¬ 
sider the means of cure, or rather prevention, must be as varied as the 
causes.—F, J. 
CHRYSANTHEMUMS FOR EXHIBITION. 
(Mr. H. Shoesmith’s piper. — Continued from page 67.) 
As soon as the bloom buds are set and swelling, the plants wil 1 
require top-dressing, and for this I find nothing better than fibry 
loam, adding to half a bushel of the same a 5-inch potful of Clay’s 
Fertiliser. I give an occasional watering with weak soot water till 
the buds “ burst,” and afterwards my plants receive no manure of 
any kind. Here let me express my belief that the principal cause of 
the flowers damping is overfeeding with stimulants, for whilst we 
hear on all sides this year growers complaining of “damp "I have 
lost but one bloom—a Val d’Andorre—which had caught the “ drip.” 
House the plants before the buds show colour, keep plenty of air on 
at all times, and use tire heat only after watering, or on damp sun¬ 
less days ; placing them so that the blooms may develope as near as 
possible to the glass. As they appear treat green fly, mildew, and 
earwigs as your deadliest foes. Many are the not unpleasant even¬ 
ing hours I have spent with a tight catching the latter enemy, an I 
giving them a squeeze between thumb and finger. 
At the end of this short paper I have named a selection of varieties 
which are all good, and in passing would remark that it is very easy 
to grow too many varieties, especially of the Japanese. There is 
much difference in people’s taste as to form and colour. My own 
favours those close yet graceful forms, as in Mdlle. Lacroix, Belle 
Paule, and M. Astorg, rather than the more spreading Fair Maid of 
Guernsey, Meg Merrilies, and Baronne de Prailly ; still, these latter 
sorts hold a high position as exhibition flowers. Madame Clemence 
Audiguier everybody likes, and hard indeed would he be to please 
who found fault with a good specimen of Boule d’Or ; Marguerite 
Marrouch, one of the most effective ; Jeanne Delaux, Val d’Andorre ; 
the long-named one, Triomphe de la Rue des Chalets ; Mons. Ardene ; 
the fantastic Golden Dragon ; Thunberg, Triomphe du Nord, and 
bronzy Japonaise ; Criterion, and the delicately coloured Madame 
J. Laing, with the noble Comte de Germiny. These are flowers 
among the Japanese that memory calls to mind when the flowering 
season is over. That noble family of “ Empresses,” Princess of 
Wales, Mrs. Heale, Hero of Stoke Newington, Princess of Teck, 
John Salter, Prince Alfred, and Lord Wolseley. What would in¬ 
curved stands be like without these ? Improvement seems slow in 
the reflexed class, but still it can boast of the richest coloured Chrys¬ 
anthemum in cultivation, Cullingfordi. 
There is no royal road to success in Chrysanthemum growing, and 
to get flowers worthy of the position of “ first prize,” one must give 
the plants constant, aye loving care ; must study closely the peculiari¬ 
ties of individual varieties, for many of the best forms are capricious 
beauties ; must think for himself. We have frequently heard persons 
speaking of some successful grower such remarks as—“ He ought to 
be able to do it. See what splendid loam he can command ! ” or 
“ If I had his houses and his help I could do it,” and so on. Again, 
many growers who are not particularly successful with the flower 
imagine that their more favoured brethren have some patent medicine 
—I mean manure—and with a mysterious air keep the secret locked 
up in their own breasts. Nothing of the kind. The secret is, hard 
work. Do not be one of these demure ones, but go in with a deter¬ 
mination to excel; persevere till all the details are mastered ; and if 
you do not possess facilities for growing a thousand plants grow a 
hundred and be satisfied with the smaller classes, for just as good 
blooms are wanted—indeed, competition is often the most keen—to 
win the twelves and sixes as in the classes for forty-eight, 
I shall be well pleased if in this short paper I have conveyed to 
some one among you a little of my own enthusiasm ; for be assured 
that, although books and papers will greatly assist you in your work, 
if you follow them to the letter, without thinking for yourself, 
or being guided by seasons and circumstances, in my humble opinion 
the goal will not be reached. With this saving clause I should like 
to strongly recommend a work on our favourite, lately published by 
that skilful grower Mr. E. Molyneux, Bishop’s Waltham, Hants ; a 
book full of detail, and treating on all modes of cultivation, which 
for its cheapness as well as for the soundness of its teaching should 
be in the hands of every cultivator of the autumn queen. 
As I am speaking to “ brothers of the craft,” I should like to 
mention, in concluding, an important element towards success— 
employers’ sympathy. Should they be against exhibiting, grow your 
plants in a style that will meet their wishes. My own, I am pleased 
to add, is a gentleman well known for his love of flowers, and of 
whom it may well be said, “ Age cannot wither, nor custom stale ” 
his intense fondness for horticulture. 
TWENTY-FOUR INCURVED. 
Alfred Salter 
Barbara 
Baron Beast 
Cherub 
Emily Dale 
Empress of India 
Golden Empress 
Hero of Stoke Newington 
Jardin des Plantes 
Jeanne d’Arc 
John Salter 
Lady Hardinge 
Lady Carey 
Lord Alcester 
Lord Wolseley 
Mr. Bunn 
Mrs. Heale 
Mrs. W. Shipman 
Nil Desperandum 
Prince Alfred 
Princess of Teck 
Princes? of Wales J 
Queen of England 
Refulgence 
TWELVE 
Christine, Go’den 
Christine, Peach 
Christine, Pink 
Christine, White 
Chevalier Domage 
Cloth of Gold 
REFLEX ED. 
Cullingfordi 
Dr. Sharpe 
Distinction 
Mdlle. M. Tezier 
King of the Crimsons 
Phidias 
THIRTY-SIX JAPANESE. 
Album Plenum 
Baronne de Prailly 
Boule d’Or 
Bde Paule 
Comte de Germiny 
Criterion 
Duchess of Albany (Jackson) 
Elaine 
Fair Maid of Guernsey 
Fernand Feral 
Flamme de Punch 
Golden Dragon 
Grandiflorum 
Japonaise 
Jeanne Delaux 
L’Adorable 
La Triomphante 
Maiden’s Blush 
Marguerite Marrouch 
Meg Merrilies 
Madame C. Audiguier 
Madame de Sevin 
Madame J. Laing 
Mdlle. Lacroix 
Mons. Ardene 
Mons. Astorg 
Mons. Burnet 
Mons. J. Laing 
Mon?. N. Davis 
Mons. Turin 
Peter the Great 
Soliel Levant 
Thunherg 
Triomphe de la Rue des 
Triomphe du Nord [Chalets 
Val d’Andorre 
At the close of the reading of the above paper, which was per¬ 
formed by deputy, Mr. Shoesmith being unable to be present, a 
discussion took place among the mem' ers on several of the cultural 
points named therein. Mr. J. Pavey, in the course of a few able 
remarks, expressed his opinion that the increasing tendency to grow 
exceptionally large blooms led to the employment of costly manures 
and the frequent production of an undesirable coarseness in 
the shape and character of the flowers. He thought that societies 
did wrong in offering prizes to encourage this state of things; that a 
gardener who grew a dozen blooms of fair size and quality on one 
plant, really merited much greater distinction as a skilful cultivator 
than another who grew one or two large and coarse blooms by the 
same means; and finally, that the chief and true aim of horticultural 
