July 28, 1894. 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
75 
to the plant, or that which is not required ? If this is put before 
us we shall know the requirements of the plant, and how to 
feed and treat it generally ; also what plant food is contained in 
the soil; how there may be a deficiency ; what there may be 
deficient in certain soils ; how to correct this evil ; what manures 
to give, or how to treat good, bad or indifferent soils ; what to 
apply to bring about certain conditions which are favourable to soils 
and crops. 
With correct scientific facts upon all these points we shall be in 
a different position to what we are in at this moment. We are told 
by Mr. Gilmour on page 424 that vapour will hold no plant food 
of any description, and he gives a demonstration— i.e., the manure 
in a bucket and the clear condensed water upon a piece of glass 
placed over it—enough to satisfy him apparently that condensed 
clear water is pure and free from any plant food of any kind. If 
it contains plant food—this is what he says—then chemists cannot 
obtain water chemically pure by distillation. 
Let me tell Mr. Gilmour that all soluble elements and com¬ 
pounds which volatilise at a lower temperature than water, and 
even those which require more heat to volatilise them may be found 
in the water condensed upon the glass. If he collects this water, 
and shakes some new slaked lime up in some clear water and allow 
it to settle, pour off the clear liquid, and add a little of this to the 
collected condensed water, he will find it will turn it milky. To 
another portion if he adds a little lime, then smells for ammonia, I 
think he will find it. As a second test let him add an excess of 
sodium hydrate, and gently heat, he will find ammonia, that is if 
there was any in the bucket of manure water. 
Unless water is required chemically pure, distilled water will 
contain all organic elements or compounds that will volatilise at 
a lower or higher temperature than it takes to volatilise water. 
Upon a small scale, if a pint of water is distilled, only about an 
ounce of that is had chemically pure. First we should get all the 
volatile matter over with the water, when this has all passed over pure 
water may be obtained until the organic compounds are decomposed. 
Special precautions and methods or appliances have to be used to 
purify the steam from carbonic dioxide, ammonia, and other com¬ 
pounds or elements before it reaches the condensing coil, and this 
is not done for ordinary purposes, only where pure water is required 
for quantitative chemical analysis for those elements and com¬ 
pounds. Therefore Mr. Gilmour is at sea. 
I will ask your readers to believe that water which is brought 
up to the surface by evaporation will contain a great deal of the 
organic and inorganic elements and compounds that are soluble ; they 
will be held in solution until the rarefied water reaches the surface, 
when the water becomes more rarefied, and passing off it leaves all 
its solid inorganic and organic impurities upon or close to the 
surface of the soil. These being soluble they are carried down 
by the rain ; the plant can and does appropriate this soluble matter, 
whether it is passing in an upward or downward position. 
In manuring all classes of light soil no doubt it is a good 
practice to fill in the bottom trench with 6 inches of green 
manure ; at the same time some manure should be incorporated 
with all the soil above this bed of manure, so that the roots can 
ramify and feed upon the food contained therein. If the season 
is a dry one any moisture that remains in the green manure will 
rise and bring up food that may be in solution, and afford nourish¬ 
ment to the plant. Deep-rooting plants can and do go down or 
send down roots for moisture and food. 
If the season is wet then most of the soluble plant food will 
get washed out and carried into the subsoil never to return. 
Plants in these seasons get very sappy and grow grossly. Under 
these conditions mineral plant food should be given as a top¬ 
dressing, but no organic or nitrogenous manure should be used. 
I trust some able pens will thoroughly thrash this subject out. 
I shall return to it, and give what information I can upon the 
composition of soils and plants, for the benefit of others or for 
the criticism of more able and scientific pens than my own.— 
G. A. Bishop, Wighhoich Manor Gardens. 
It is a pity Mr. Raillem is so busy that he cannot reply “ as fully 
as he could wish” to his correspondents on this matter. If he has 
anything further to say, now is the time to say it, while all that 
has been written on the subject is fresh in the minds of the readers 
of the Journal of Horticulture. 
Mr. Raillem says (page 51) he withdrew the statement that 
plants can only assimilate vaporous moisture. This is what he 
calls withdrawing it. “ I now gather that the root hairs of plants 
have the power by mechanical decomposition of getting at that 
vaporous form of liquid which alone they can assimilate ” (page 409). 
If this it a withdrawal of the original statement I must be very 
stupid, for I cannot see it. However, Mr. Raillem is too busy to 
explain more fully, so I will pass on to his remarkable reasons for 
believing that water does exist in an intermediate state in which it 
is neither vapour nor water. 
Here again I must be very stupid, for I can see nothing in his 
illustration which is at all to the point. An ordinary atmosphere 
may contain perhaps 10 to 20 per cent, of moisture or vapour ; in a 
Scotch mist the atmosphere may be half vapour, and a cloud that 
evolves large hailstones may be more, but I fail to s^e any reason 
in this for supposing that any of these atmospheres contain anything 
but vapour.—D. Gilmour. 
VIOLAS AT CHISWICK. 
I COULD not help feeling amused at the remarks of your able cor¬ 
respondent “ A. D.” (page 31) re the new Violas at Chiswick. If we were 
all ready to accept his dogmatic diction I am very much afraid the 
Violas in the south would suffer in consequence. One would gather 
from his remarks he is under the impression the men of the north have 
one type of flower while the fanciers of the south incline to a totally 
distinct form. Such is not the case. The new type of rayless Violas 
introduced by Dr. Stuart of Chirnside seemed to have impressed “A. D.” 
very unfavourably. Yet were he to grow them I feel sure he would 
alter his opinion on their merits as a garden decorative flower. Where 
they are planted as beds or even in lines their beauty is almost unsur¬ 
passed. Take, for instance, a bed of Violetta or Blue Gown, with charm¬ 
ing carpet-like foliage and myriads of white and blue flowers. Such a 
bed must be seen to understand its real beauty. 
I am quite ready to admit many varieties are not sufficiently distinct, 
but I cannot accept “A. D.’s” sweeping condemnation of the majority. 
At present, while the type is still in its infancy there is not sufficient 
diversity of colouring to make them valuable as exhibition Violas, 
neither will they ever be able to compete with the larger types, but no 
doubt in the near future classes at exhibitions will be provided for them. 
The London Pansy Society did include a few classes in the schedule this 
season, but the result was not a happy one, because the type is not 
generally known. 1 cannot agree with “ A. D.” when he tells us they 
look well on wired frames at exhibitions, for it is the worst form of 
seeing their true beauty. They are essentially decorative plants, and as 
such we must regard them. 
I daresay the Viola does flourish best under the conditions named by 
your correspondent, but I would not have it thought for a moment 
the Viola is unsuited for our southern climate, for I can point out 
gardens that have been a mass of flowers throughout the summer, and 
will be so till the frost comes and cuts them off. To say six varieties 
are all that need be grown is absurd. If the seifs only are grown, what 
is to become of the Goldfinch and forms of Duchess of Fife? They are 
quite as effective for bedding purposes as many of the seifs, and far 
more popular. It is quite out of the question to judge the merits or 
otherwise of such plants from a single clump or two. To assert that 
six varieties of Violas would satisfy all requirements is analogous to 
saying six varieties of Carnations are all that we require, yet from 
“ A. D.’s” point of view such is the case.—J. B. K. 
CARNATIONS AT EDENSIDE. 
The name of Edenside will bring to the minds of many people 
thoughts of beauty and of peace. Peaceful indeed is the position—a 
pastoral vale, and flowers in their season give beauty. One would, and 
not unnaturally, expect to find the Carnations there to be in the front 
rank of excellence ; and so they are. For upwards of thirty years 
Mr. Douglas has been labouring assiduously in the improvement of 
florists’ flowers of almost all kinds, and not the least part of his energy 
has been expended on the Carnation and Picotee. That his efforts have 
been crowned with success is conclusively proved by the numerous sterling 
varieties that have been put in commerce by him, many of which, though 
now some years old, being still recognised as leading sorts. When, 
therefore, it was learned that he had taken some ground, and intended 
erecting houses solely for the production of florists’flowers, growers, both 
amateur and professional, were on the tip-toe of expectation that they 
soon see something good. 
The Edenside Nursery is situated at Great Bookham, in Surrey, and 
may readily be reached on the South-Western Kail way from Waterloo, 
and, of course, from the various stations down the line. There are now 
three houses erected, each 100 feet long and 18 feet in width. Two of 
these are at the present time filled with Carnations in bloom, and in 
almost endless variety, and the other about half stocked with the same 
kind of plants. The first structure that is reached from the entrance is 
by far the most handsome, being a light, yet withal, substantial one, 
built by Messrs. Foster & Pearson. There is a central step staging, and 
flat stages on each side, the former of which is lacking in the other two 
houses. The holding capacity of No 1 is excellent, there being close 
on, if not quite, 4000 plants therein in bloom at the present moment, 
the remaining two structures not, of course, providing accommodation 
for quite so many. In addition to these there are numbers of frames, 
principally occupied with Auriculas, both the show and alpine varieties 
being largely represented in such health as warrant the supposition that 
more will be heard of them when the year 1895 rolls in. 
Though Mr. Douglas has been so successful a raiser of Carnations, 
it must not be thought that the collection is comprised of seedlings of 
his own raising alone, for such is by no means the case, in fact quite the 
contrary, as all the best varieties procurable, no matter by whom they 
