THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
January G. 
258 
expensive thing to exhibit, and persons ought not to be 
certain to make a loss even if they take a prize, which would 
he the case with Bantams coming from the country.” 
We regret to notice that the Prize List for the Here¬ 
ford Poultry Show has followed the old error of saving 
their premiums by confounding distinct varieties of 
fowls in a single class. Thus, for instance, all the four 
kinds of Hamburghs compete together, and the same 
with Polands, Bantams, and Ducks. The principle is 
an erroneous one, unsatisfactory to the exhibitor and 
the public, while it imposes an unfair task on the judge. 
In the infancy of Poultry Societies such mistakes wore 
unavoidable, but now it is far better to have no show 
whatover than to conduct it on a bad system. 
FRUIT-CULTURE. 
A few weeks since (page 180) my respected friend 
and coadjutor, Mr. Fish, took occasion to call attention 
to my practice in hardy fruit-culture, and introduced an 
extract from a letter which it appears had been written 
by some gentleman who had visited our gardens during 
the past fruit season, and who spoke in warm terms of 
his impressions concerning the fruits. I cannot imagine 
who the gentleman may be, but I hereby tender him 
my best thanks for his good wishes both to myself and 
fruit-culture, and also lor affording me an opportunity 
of occasionally bringing the matter before our readers, 
although to some it may appear a thrice-told tale. It 
somehow happens that even the most self-evident truths 
require to be repeated, again and again, before they can 
attract sufficient attention, or leave that impress in the 
human mind which shall bring forth fruit, or, in other 
words, cause the reader not only to think but to act. 
In my practice there are no secrets. I am not par¬ 
ticularly partial to mysteries, and, indeed, if I were, I 
do not think that I could manufacture them out of such 
materials. Simplicity is the basis; for I have long held 
the opinion that in fruit-culture any roundabout plan, 
involving, of course, much expense, is unworthy of 
consideration. Plans, systems, call them what we will, 
may be ingenious, may be illustrative ; but, to be gene¬ 
rally useful to a utilitarian public, they must possess two. 
other qualifications—they must be economic, and afford 
every possible chance of success. They should, more¬ 
over, possess so much simplicity in carrying out, that 
any thinking person, although unacquainted with gar¬ 
dening matters, might carry them out without difficulty. 
The fact is, that the question of fruit-culture was 
fairly overlaid, a score or two years since, by systems of 
pruning. So elaborate had they become, and withal 
looked so charming on paper, that folks had almost 
forgotten that fruit-trees have roots which will as little 
hear to be treated with indifference as the branches. 
I do not here intend to attempt a settlement of the 
long-pending quarrel between the Messrs. Prune-all and 
Prune-none, as these fierce belligerents have opened the 
question entirely in their own way. I, for one, am 
conteut to let them settle it in like manner; I advocate 
common-sense pruning. 
It is now some twenty-four years since my attention 
became strongly attracted towards the question of fruit- 
tree culture. Having been born and bred in a nursery 
containing twenty-four acres, and in which quantities of 
I fruit-trees were grown, I had every opportunity of wit- 
I ncssing, during my early days, the various “ rule-of- 
thumb ” processes considered requisite by the knowing 
i ones of those times. Physiological enquiries concerning 
the functions of plants, trees, &c., were confined to a 
very limited sphere of operation; and, indeed, if any 
one in those days had held such dreamings, he would 
have found it particularly expedient to keep them almost 
hermetically sealed, for it would have been excessively 
prejudicial to his reputation amongst “sound men” to 
broach such gimeraek notions. I well remember a very 
ingenious gentloman, who had been studying Sir J. 
Sinclair, coming frequently to the said nursery to chat 
a little time away with the ground foreman, his con¬ 
versation generally smacking of chemistry. He was 
attempting to get old John to classify soils ; but not so. 
John, although apparently very attentive at the time, 
always persisted in calling him “ Dr. Ceilcareous ” behind 
his back—this term being the only one John could re¬ 
member out of the whole vocabulary. 
However, I must back to my subject. Twenty years 
ago, and more, then, having been, drawn somewhat 
closely to a consideration of the hows and whys of 
fruit-culture, I could not help being struck with the fact 
that our ordinary fruits were not unfrequently more 
fruitful in the hands of the cottager, or in a state of 
nature, than in the pampered condition in which we 
might see them in the kitchen-gardens of the noble and 
the affiuent, with all the paraphernalia of highly-wrought 
borders, and other expensive affairs. In those days I 
could never pass an old orchard Pear-tree, of perhaps a 
century’s standing, or more, without reflecting how it 
came to pass that such trees should bear so heavily 
without the pruner’s aid. In the garden case, I saw 
that the general char deter of the young wood was totally 
different; rambling trees, with coarse breast-wood, ap¬ 
pearing as though they were cultivated for the sake of 
their spray; in the natural case—or accidental, if you 
will—the trees producing some three or four inches 
only of young shoot annually, and that, too, chiefly at 
the terminal points. Old Thorns, too, Hollies, and 1 
can scarcely say what, all seemed to point to some 
great fact, and one which I was exceedingly desirous to 
ascertain. I felt persuaded that, say what people would 
about this and that tree being tender and requiring 
coaxing, there was some radical mistake in the culture, 
and that all the arguments which had been used to 
justify usages wore fallacious, and merely meant to hide 
what could not be explained in a satisfactory way. I 
felt assured, betimes, of one thing, that no system of 
pruning could ever prove satisfactory in itself, whatever 
might be its merits, unless accompanied by certain root 
conditions of even greater import. 
Knowing, of course, that all old kitchen-gardens 
were rich in decayed vegetable matter, even to repletion; 
knowing, also, that gardeners, in general, were compelled 
to crop such soils as close as the line could be drawn; 
and that in so doing, coupled with a constant necessity 
for manuring on behalf of vegetable culture, I felt 
assured that gardeners in general had been inviegled into 
a species of self-deception; and that when their fruits 
failed, although their Cauliflowers and Celery succeeded, 
that they were forced to cover their retreat by making 
all look nice on the wall, or by neat pruning systems. 
And not only the wall borders, but those of tho open 
kitchen-garden partook of the same character, as well 
they might. These things, I say, then, led me at once 
to the conclusion, that an unworthy compromise had 
boen made, and that these practices were fundamentally 
wrong; and that the question of fruit-culture required 
to be considered in itself, totally apart from vegetable 
culture; for I felt persuaded, that so long as the two 
cases were kept in a mixed condition, so long would 
erroneous practices prevail. 
The question being thus shorn of its extra appurte¬ 
nances stood on its own foundation ; and the mind 
thus unfettered (in other cases than Pears or Cabbages) 
begins to think anew on the subject; or, in other words, 
approaches the case with less prejudice. 
And now arose, in my mind, the idea of attempting to 
