jAjtUAHY 1. 
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION. 
24.J 
worms never flourish togetlier for any length of time. It is 
not gooil policy to sweep worm casts in the autumn, al- 
iliough gartleners must do so for the sake of appearances. 
The better way is to leave them till Tebruary. Then, in t/n/ 
irenlhcr, to dress the lawn, or that part of it, with very fine 
coal-ashes and nothing else; but the ashes over the worms 
may be one-inch thick, and where no worms are.half au- 
inch will do. Then, with a bush harrow run over the sur¬ 
face repeatedly, until the worm-casts and the ashes are 
thoroughly mixed, and half-tixed into and among the grass. 
If clover-seeds or grass seeds are wanted, sow them ore/- the 
ashes and before the bush-barrowing. Never put rotten-dung 
on lawns, it does a great deal more harm than good, by en¬ 
couraging worms and by making a pateby-like surface, owing 
to the impossibility of putting it on of equal strength and 
thickness. The right time to hunt and kill worms is from 
the middle of April to the end of iNIay; clear lime-water, as 
strong as the strongest lime can make it, is the only safe 
; w’ay to kid worms, and it never hurts grass. 
Recollect that the .SoUonim jusminoules is not perfectly 
; h.ardy. It requires some protection in hard winters ; and to 
j matcli it in that respect, and in every other respect, includ- 
I ing your own good taste, plant a strong Ccnnot/ius Kziireiis, 
and train it like a Peach tree.] 
TIME rOR CUTTING SCIONS OR GRAFTS.—IMP, 
AS A NAME FOR A GRAFT. — IMPROVING 
WATER FOR MAKING TEA. 
“Will you inform me the proper time to cut imps, or 
scions, for grafting Apples and Pears ? Is it good prac¬ 
tice to cut them now, and put them in the soil; or to let 
them remain on the trees until grafting time? There is one 
disadvantage in my case, wbiidi is, that the trees at my re¬ 
sidence, from whence I shall take the scions, being upon 
lighter soil, throw up their sap a week or more days befm’e 
those at my farm, on which the stocks to be grafted are 
grown,—these being on.a stiff clay marl. Should there be 
any of last year’s wood cut to the scion, or should all 
be of this year’s growth? What is the length the scion 
should be? 
] “ Can you inform me whether carbonate of soda is inju- 
j rious, taken twice a-day, put into a tea-pot, to extract the 
I tea, the water being so hard. I cannot get a cup of tea 
without putting an extravagant quantity of tea, or as much 
carbonate of soda as will lie on a sixpence. I have used a 
little pearl-ash, a less quantity of that will do. I am com¬ 
pelled to use something. —Guaft.” 
[As the trees from which you purpose to take grafts be¬ 
ing on a light soil, vegetate earlier in spring than those 
on which you intend to insert the grafts, you should, by all 
meaus, take off the grafts now, and bury them tw'o-thirds of 
their length in the ground on the north side of a hedge or 
wall. There is no particular length at wdiich they are to be 
cut until grafting time, and then make your scions (all 
young wood), just so long as to leave about three buds 
above the point of union. In what part of the country is 
“ imp ’■ used, to designate a scion ; and how else is it ap- 
j)lied? We thought it had become obsolete; altliough 
Railey says, “ Ijrr among gardiners, is a kind of graft to be 
set in a tree.”' ’There is no doubt that it is a derivation 
from the .Anglo-Saxon impun, to graft, to plant. Tlr. Stevens, 
j in a note to Pistol’s calling the king a “most royal imp of 
I fame,”—i/cary part ii., act b, scene .5,—says, that “an 
! imp is a shoot, in its primitive sense, but means a son 
i in Shakspeare.” Imp and imphm, are still used for graft 
and grafting in some parts oi' Wales, we believe. 
The quantity of carbonate of soda you emx)loy to soften 
the water for tea-brewing cannot be injurious, for its efiicacy 
depends upon its decomposing the gypsom (sulphate of 
lime) in the water you employ. Ey that decomposition it 
becomes sulphate of soda, or ghutber salt, the well-known 
aperient; but the quantity is too small to be influential in 
that way.] 
POULTRY SHOWS. 
Hants (Sodth). lltti and l.itli .lanuary, at, Faroliam. .Spc. James 
James, Ksq., Fareham. Kntries close Itecemher 3)st, 1855. 
Liverpool. iGtli, 17 th, and 18th of January. Sec. W. C. Worrall, 
Esq., 6, Lower Castle Street. Entries close December 24th. 
Preston and North Lancashire. Jan.gthand lOth, at Preston. 
Secs. Messrs. Burnett, Leigh, and Hayhurst, Preston. 
Vale op Aylesbury. January 2nd and Srd. Secs. J. T). JIuddiman, 
and Jas. Allen. Entries close December 20lh. 
N.B. —Secretiirics will oblij'e us hj/ sending early copies of their lists. 
The review of a past year is always a serious thing 
to enter upon. 'I'he lirst feeling should he one of grati¬ 
tude, that while so many with whom we were associated 
have passed away wo have been preserved ; jind the next 
should be to ask ourselves whether we have redeemed 
the promises we made when the year we now review 
was bursting into existence. Our task, however, is ren¬ 
dered easier by our ability to answer the last question 
in the allirmative, so far us pledged in this pursuit. 
During xthe first six months of the past year The 
PouLTiiY Chuonicle stood uloiie, hut, spite of every 
elibrt, it was a struggle for existence; and as any ap¬ 
proach to profit seemed to become more and more dis- 
! taut, it was resolved to associate it with some periodical 
older and more favoured by public support than itself. 
Hence the connection in which we now stand. These 
explanations become necessary before we enter upon the 
review of the past year. 
The every day qualities of the Durlavffs have kept 
them in steady popularity, and their progress has been 
uninterrupted. Beauty of feather has been combined 
to large size, and although they have not reached the 
prices made by fowls a few years since, yet they always 
find a market, and realise sums not only sufficient to 
remunerate the breeder, but to incite him to exertion in 
producing the best specimens. These birds have fre¬ 
quently made from five to seven guineas each, and one 
cock was recently sold for fifteen pounds. It is an indi¬ 
cation of an improving state when a large number i 
are sold at a good, though moderate price, rather than a i 
few at a large rate. The most preposterous ojiinion ever 
yet formed in poultry matters, viz., that double combs 
were impure, has been quite set aside by the decisions 
at all the principal shows, and tiiose who were sticklers 
for any particular plumage have gradually given up 
i their notions. 
The remarkably cold and late sjiring was so unfa- i 
vourable to them, that the SjHOiisJt cltichens have been | 
late, and this has caused some to think this breed bas 
not made much progress ; but we shall be much deceived 
if the chickens wo have seen do not vindicate their i 
I claims to progress in this year. Spanish jnillets are things 
I of time, so far as White Faces are concerned, and can- 
! not reach perfection till a certain age. Flnless increased 
I size is attained, wc do not see where the inqirovement i 
is to come from in the adult birds. There is one thing j 
worthy of remark in the cocks of this breed—formerly , 
every bird had a drooping comb, but when it was known i 
an upright one was preferable, breeders took jiains, and I 
a drooping comb is seldom met with even in numerous 
classes. Amateurs in every race may take a lesson from | 
this. i 
We have been glad to mark improvement in the 
Cochin-China classes. If birds could speak, none would 
have more reason to coiiqdain than these that they were j 
jielted and really spoiled during two years, subjected to 
all sorts of unnatural treatment to enable them to obtain i 
a fictitious price, and then suddenly cast aside as ! 
