1875. ] 
GARDEN GOSSIP. 
215 
GARDEN GOSSIP. 
QjfHE National Carnation and Picotee Society held its annual show on the 
vvvj) 13 th ult., in the Manchester Botanical Garden. The date was too late for 
< §^ > the Southern florists, but those from the North mustered in force, the re- 
^ suit being an excellent show. At the meeting of subscribers, the Hon. 
Treasurer and Secretary, the Rev. F. D. Horner, reported that after defraying all expenses 
of the exhibition, a balance of £14 remained to be carried on to next year’s fund. The 
exhibition is fixed for August 11, 1876, and Mr. E. S. Dodwell was elected President by 
acclamation. 
- ££he annual meeting of the Pelargonium Society was held on July 22nd, 
on which occasion several of the members dined together at the Criterion Hotel. 
The treasurer, Dr. Denny, reported a healthy state of the finances, a balance of 
over £20 remaining after paying the prizes awarded at the exhibition on the previous day, 
and all the working expenses. The sum paid out in prizes was £40. It was hoped that the 
Society, now that it had become better known, might draw around it more abundant sup¬ 
port, so that encouragement might be extended to other classes of Pelargoniums, besides the 
Zonals, which was the class specially in view when the Society w T as originally founded. The 
inducements offered by the Society may, it is hoped, set hybridisers to work, and so be the 
means of obtaining new types of this useful decorative family. 
- ®he usual reports on the Condition of the Fruit Crops published by the 
Gardeners’ Chronicle show that in the various counties of Great Britain and 
Ireland the crop has been unusually abundant. This remark applies almost 
equally well to fruits of all descriptions, and says much for the ripening of the wood last 
autumn, and the relative absence of spring frosts this season. Of course, there has been 
some drawback, and that was furnished by the excessive summer rains, owing to which 
Strawberries, Cherries, Currants, and other small fruits were spoiled in large quantities, and 
in some cases the condition of the fruit was such that it was not deemed worth while to 
gather it. 
-- £1 New Hybrid Lily just bloomed in Mr. Waterer’s nursery at Knap 
Hill proves to be one of the most beautiful which has yet appeared in our gardens. 
We hope shortly to publish a coloured figure of it. It has the appearance of 
being a cross between L. auraium and L. speciosum, but partakes most of the latter parent. 
The flowers, when the segments are straightened out, measure nearly 14 in. across, the 
petaline segments being 4 in. wide and recurved from the flatly-expanded base. The colour 
is white towards the tips of tho segments, suffused with rich rosy-crimson near the base, and 
there dotted over with deep crimson spots and warts, while its fragrance is delicate-and most 
agreeable. 
- $Je. El wes, in a recent notice of Herr Leichtlin’s garden, invites 
attention to the extraordinary Varieties of Lilies which exist in the gardens of 
Japan, apparently hybrids between L. longiflorum , auratum , and sjieciosum. 
Their beauty is astonishing, and their variety endless ; but whether on account of their rarity, 
or from the delicacy of their bulbs, they are still quite unknown in England. A number of 
these plants were, it is said, exhibited at the Vienna Exhibition, some of which are still alivo 
in Europe, among them being a plant named L. Elizahethce, which resembled L. speciosum 
rubrum in colours, and L. auratum in form and size. 
- Nearly eighty years ago it was asserted that camphor had power to 
Hasten Germination , and a similar property was subsequently attributed to chlorine, 
bromine, and iodine. These statements have been recently put to the test of 
experiment by Heck el, and found to be correct. Tho seeds of Raplanus sativvs, exposed to 
the action of pure water, began to germinate after an average interval of eight days; similar 
seeds, kept moist with iodine-water, germinated in five days; with bromine-water in three, 
