FRUIT-CULTURE V. CREMATION. 
55 
1875. ] 
best early white grapes. Early Smyrna -Frontignan is a Frontignan-flavoured 
grape, and ripened as early as tlie Royal Muscadine. Early Saumur Frontignan 
is another very early-ripening Frontignan-flavoured sort. The Prolific Sweet¬ 
water and Buckland Sweetwater ripened in the end of September, and got to a 
fine amber colour in October, and their flavour was excellent. 
Of early Black Grapes, the Sarbelle Frontignan , a purple Frontignan-flavoured 
variety, ripened in the beginning of September, but it has only a small bunch. 
The Esperione or Espiran , the hardiest of the Black Hamburgh section, ripened 
in the middle of September, and was finely coloured. The Welbeck Black Tripoli 
ripened in the middle of October, the bunches being as fine as some of the same 
variety grown in the vineries. 
To show that the fine warm dry summer of 1874 has been particularly favour¬ 
able for ripening Grapes in unheated structures, I may state that two plants of the 
Muscat of Alexandria which were planted out in mistake with the hardy sorts both 
ripened their bunches ; the grapes were not very highly coloured, but perfectly 
Muscat-flavoured and good. A plant of Pearson’s Ferdinand de Lesseps Vine 
likewise, lately planted out in the same collection, has borne some bunches 
this year, and promises to bear well as a hardy Grape. 
Some of the above varieties of Hardy Grapes will ripen their fruit, even in 
bad seasons, in all our southern counties, if planted on a south aspect on walls or 
buildings. There cannot be a finer ornamental climber on a poor man’s cottage 
than a Vine, whether in leaf or in fruit, but it requires attention in nailing or 
tying it to the walls, and in properly thinning and stopping the shoots every year. 
If allowed to grow wild, it gets battered about by the wind, and is then both un¬ 
sightly and unproductive. There is no occasion for making expensive borders in 
which to grow hardy Grapes out-of-doors, for if the soil is anything at all of a fertile 
nature and drained, they will succeed well on it. In planting them in unheated 
structures, it would perhaps be better to give them a newly-made border, if the 
natural soil is not suitable or drained, with the view to the production of good- 
sized bunches and well-flavoured berries.— William Tillery, Welbeck . 
FRUIT-CULTURE versus CREMATION. 
READ with some interest Mr. Forsyth’s remarks on the above subject 
(Florist, 1874, 27G), but am afraid they will be somewhat apt to mislead. 
Is “ Mother Earth robbed of her rights,” if the lamp of science shows us 
that it is better to employ a quick and cleanly method of decomposition. 
instead of a slow and repulsive one? I think decidedly not. Fire merely separates tho 
chemical elements of bodies (which elements are indestructible), and sots them free in a 
harmless form. The gases gonerated by heat, being lighter than tho air near the surface of 
the earth, mount rapidly, and leave us the pure air to breathe; while Dame Nature, who is 
a perfect chemist, just as sho is perfect everywhere, when man does not thwart her, mixes her 
manures up among tho moisture-laden clouds, and down tlioycomo in tho most perfect form of 
rain. This is one reason that rain does plants more good than spring-water, simply becauso 
the latter is spent, having lost its manurial properties by contact with the dry soil—one of 
the best deodorisers—or with tlio root-perforated earth. Flosh and blood, when decomposed, 
are both valuable manures without a doubt,, but in a crude stato thoy do far moro harm than 
good. 
