THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
October 23. 
r>o 
life pictures as “ Our Own Correspondent,” at Paris, Mr. 
P. E. Iveir, I sliall endeavour to give you such a notion 
of how they did the flower-garden department at Kcw 
this season, that you might do the very like next year, 
if you have the means. Rut, first of all, let me say that 
this season has been too dry for Kew Gardens; that the 
soil is not good for Roses; that the gravel is decidedly 
had, and some of it not fit to walk on, without strong 
soles, being quite loose and pebbly on the terraces and 
round the large conservatory. How far they have im¬ 
proved on their system of bedding you shall see pre¬ 
sently. They made a very bold start at first, when they 
began to flower-garden here, a few years back, and I gave 
them all the help I could in kinds of plants. The 
Crystal Palace people were far more cautious ; they did 
not introduce half the kinds of plants for their first 
planting as they did at Kew. 'J'he fewer kinds of plants 
and colours, the less chance for mistakes and bad taste. 
The beds are new, atid on clay, at the Crystal Palace ; 
while at Kcw they are old and on a touchy bottom; 
therefore, the degree of luxuriance at the Crystal Palace 
must not be looked for at Kew, without renewing one- 
half of the soil in all the flower-beds once in two years. 
D. Re.vton. 
(I’o he conli/nied.) 
DUNG - HEATED BRICK PPi’S, 
CUCUMBERS, &c. 
&c., FOR 
J. “A CORRESPONDENT, ‘Shropshire,’ would be 
obliged for a description and plan of the best known 
brick-pit for Cucumbers and Melons, to be heated by 
dung only. He has had practice only with the pigeon¬ 
holed wall, four-and-a half inches thick outside, and the 
thickness of a brick on edge inside, to form a flue. He 
proposes building walls two feet high from the bottom, 
nine inches thick, and then commence his four-and-a- 
half-iuch pigeon-holed wall, and his brick-on-cdge solid 
wall inside fora flue, to within two feet or eighteen 
inches of the top, and finish that part with a solid four- 
inch wall to carry the frame. Proposes the pit to have 
one-foot nine-inches slope, and to grow upon a trellis.” 
With every desire to oblige, the task of giving the 
plans and specifications of the best Inioxvii pit for such 
a purpose, is one which it would require very strong 
nerves, and a vast amount of enthusiasm to undertake. 
A young man might very readily do so; one more ex-' 
perienced, would feel that more depended upon the at¬ 
tention of the cultivator, than upon any one specified 
plan. I have seen Cucumbers grown successfully under 
a great variety of circumstances, and have been suc¬ 
cessful with pits and frames constructed in many ways, 
and have found that, provided a bottom-heat of from 
7-")'^ to 80'^, was secured, with a to])-heat at night, from 
65° to 70°, with a rise of 10° to 15° from sunshine, that 
there was but little difference as to the minutim of modes 
employed. For such a purpose as that contemplated, a 
pit six feet wide, from four-and-a-half to five feet high 
at back, and from three to three-and-a-half feet high in 
front, rather better than the half sunk under the ground- 
level, well drained, and linings from two-and-a-half to 
three feet wide, would answer well. Instead of building 
the nine-inch wall two feet high, I would begin to 
])igeon-hole at one foot, and would carry up the flue 
within a foot of the top, so as to command atmospheric 
as well as bottom-heat. 
To secure the bottom heat right to the centre of the 
bed, I would cither carry flues across from side to side, 
on the Me Phail’s system, having these flues every 
second light; or 1 would have a chamber below the soil, 
hollow, or as hollow as possible, by means of brickbats, 
gtones, &c., piled as open as possible, I prefer these 
gtones to an open chamber, as when once heated they 
j.etain it longer, and the heat is more equal. The roots 
are also more exposed to an equality of temperature, 
than by using cross flues, as the soil placed between 
them is generally hottest at the sides of the flue. What¬ 
ever the depth of such a pit, such a stone-chamber, 
finished ofl with smaller stones, or rough gravel on the 
surface, may rise to within twenty-seven or thirty inches 
ot the glass, or thirty-six inches at farthest, which will 
give plenty of room for a foot or fifteen inches of soil, 
and top room for the leaves. I prefer a trellis for Cu¬ 
cumbers, especially when grown in small houses; but in 
such a pit as this, it will generally be least trouble to 
train the plants along the surface of the soil. If the 
ground cannot be made dry, most of the pit should 
stand above the surface. When sunk, less of the walls 
arc ex23osed, and the linings may be concealed by 
wooden coverings, or nearly so. If the flue rises nearly 
to the top of the wall, there will be no necessity for 
having higher linings. To keep the linings low, how¬ 
ever, and nearly out of sight, the dung must be partly 
made, and somewhat sweetened before using it, as fresh 
dung would not give enough of heat. As none of the 
steam could get inside, provided the linings were high 
and large, there would bo no necessity to work the dung 
much before using it. 
I have jireviously mentioned several more simple 
modes, and yet quite as successful. A jnt was built 
four-and-a-half feet at back, and three-and-a-half feet in 
front, sunk half the height; walls the width of a brick, 
the lower half pigeon-holed, but buttressed, as it were, 
by a cross division of a four-inch wall, every two and 
three lights; the inside was filled with rubble, a little 
higher than the pigeon-holes; on this the soil was 
placed, making'it firm over the rubble, so that no steam 
j)assed through the earth. Bottom-heat was thus com¬ 
municated through the pigeon-holes, and top-heat was 
secured by keeping the lining well up against the wall. 
Another pit was formed in a similar way, of a single 
inch in width, laid solid, and without j)igeon-holes; and, 
though it required a little more dung and time to heat 
the interior at first, it was quite as easily kept up after¬ 
wards. I once had such a j)it all above the ground- 
level, and it did equally well, though it required more 
dung, and was rather more difficult to cover up. 
Another pit, I once had, was built much in the same 
way; only, instead of being all brick, large slates were 
let into the wall, opposite every light, and from their 
thinness they were quickly and easily heated; but the 
slates, then, were much moi’e expensive than the bricks. 
All these modes go upon the principle of avoiding the 
chances of rank gases and steams from the dung find¬ 
ing their way to the plants. Presuppose the use of 
plenty of strong fermenting matter always at hand, and 
the loss of a good portion ot the heat from the manure 
csca 2 )ing into the atmosphere,—every one at all conver¬ 
sant with the matter knows that one barrow-load of 
sweet fermenting matter, placed directly beneath the 
roots of a plant, will communicate more heat to it than 
six or ten times the quantity placed round the solid 
walls of a jfit in which it is growing. Hence, when the 
manure is to be made the very most of, one of these 
modes has generally been adopted ;— 
Istly. The old hotbed system with frames, which, when 
dung alone was used, has seldom been surpassed; the suc¬ 
cess greatly depending upon the thorough working and 
sweetening, without too much decomposing the dung, and 
the building it in such a manner, with the assistance of 
faggots, &c., in the centre, so that enough of air would 
be admitted to carry on a slow decomposing process; and 
neither so much, nor so little, as would arrest decompo¬ 
sition altogether, and so })revent the constant giving off 
of heat, as the result of the gradual decay. 
2ndly. 'riiero was the making such a bed inside of a 
brick pit, furnished with pigeon-holed walls, to renew the 
heat by linings when it became cool. There was no danger 
