86 
THE FLORIST AND POMOLOGIST. 
[ April, 
and its appearance something like that of an elongated Glou Morceau. A First- 
class Certificate was awarded to this fine new Pear by the Fruit Committee of 
the Royal Horticultural Society at its meeting of October 23 last. The specimens 
submitted to us were ripe and in excellent condition about the middle of October. 
—T. Moore. 
WISTARIA SINENSIS. 
Sd HIS is one of the finest of all trailing plants, if we except, as a matter of 
Tj) course, the ubiquitous Virginian Creeper, to which neither smoke nor dust 
seems in the least objectionable ; and it is well worth a place in front of 
1 9* all town mansions where there is space to plant it, so that its roots can get 
plenty of moisture. Its flexible rope-like habit of growth enables one to train it 
in any direction, and whether hanging loosely and gracefully from balcony 
railings, or twined tastefully around portico pillars, it is always fresh and green 
during the summer, even if its deliciously perfumed grape-like clusters of pea¬ 
shaped flowers are never produced. Its foliage lasts until late in the autumn, 
and when contrasted with the deeper-toned Ivy, or with the rich and varied tints 
assumed by the Virginian Creeper towards the close of autumn, it is capable of 
producing some excellent effects. There is one way to obtain its clusters of mauve 
or lavender-tinted flowers not generally adopted, and well worth mention here. 
It often happens that it is trained on garden walls, near conservatories or other 
plant-houses, and if a few of its well-ripened branches are introduced through a 
hole in the wall or sash, and syringed occasionally, they soon throw out their 
flower-buds, and the flowers thus obtained come in very handy for cutting at a 
time much earlier than it flowers naturally out-of-doors, and the clusters are so 
elegant, so fragrant, and so distinct in colour, as to be universally admired.— 
F. W. Burbidge. 
A WINTER GARDEN IN THE OPEN AIR. 
j^jfHE Bedding-out system, as it is called, must certainly be admitted to be 
^ an exceedingly well-abused system, although everybody continues to 
practice it just the same. It is accused of banishing from our sight 
nearly all our former favourite spring and summer flowers, whose beauty 
and fragrance used to render our gardens just what they ought to be; it is said 
to have induced a meretricious taste for gaudy and glaring colours in flowers, to 
the exclusion of all that is simply beautiful and interesting ; if is even said to 
prevent fruit-trees on garden-walls from being trained in the correct geometrical 
style that used formerly to prevail (see p. 17). But notwithstanding all that 
may be said against the massing or grouping of plants in the flower-garden, the 
system continues and will continue to be followed out. 
The grouping together of plants is, after all, the very system which Nature, 
who never errs, adopts in their distribution. From the vegetable giants of Cali¬ 
fornia, &c., to the Lilies and pale Primroses of our woodland glades, all are found 
