14 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
OcTORETt 8. 
I understand are to remain in the machine for thirty-six 
days, and as soon as they are hatched, I shall have much 
pleasure in announcing the same,—C arlo Minasi, 16, 
Brecknock-pla.ce, Gamden-road. 
LIME AS A REMEDY FOR ROUP. 
Allow me, through the medium of your widely-circulated 
Journal, to offer a few remarks upon the article from one of 
your correspondents, in your September number of the 5th 
instant, respecting roup, &c. I beg to say, that I have a 
young Dorking similarly affected. The first symptoms are 
those described by your correspondent, namely, an affection 
of the head and throat. I have removed tho worst of them, 
and after applying all the remedies that have been recom¬ 
mended in your Journal, have failed; those that I left in 
their own quarters are all doing well, after the following 
simple remedy, namely, applying daily a small portion of 
quick lime, strewed all over the roosting place just before 
they go to roost. I think the dust from the lime causes 
them to sneeze violently, thereby cleansing the nostrils 
more effectively than by any other means I have tried. If 
any of my brother amateurs will give it a fair trial, should 
they be so unfortunate as to require it, and publish the 
results through your Journal, I shall feel it a great favour.— 
One of your Constant Readers, North of Lincoln. 
QUERIES AND ANSWERS. 
GARDENING. 
GILLYFLOWER OF THE HIGHLANDS. 
“ In addressing you in my noni dc guerre of ‘ Medicus 
Edin,’ I did not expect that my long history of the ‘ case’ 
would have been subjected to the ordeal of public criticism, 
by being printed, as Burns said of the ‘ chiel’s notes,’ or I 
would have been more chary of spinning so long a yarn, as 
you justly state, as well as more circumspect in my state¬ 
ments. I must confess my ignorance, till now, of the genus 
to which the term Gillyflower is generally applied, because, 
in my native country, the borders of the Western Highlands, 
it is the Hesperis Matronalis, and not any of the species of 
Malhiola which is known by that name; in fact, forty years 
since a Ten-week Stock was rarely, if ever, seen in a farmer’s 
kail-yard; so that the appellation so llippantly used could 
not apply to the Stock. You must, therefore, consider me, 
no less than yourself, a disbeliever in the transmutation of 
genera; but I must again repeat the assertion, that the 
loose-spiked purple double Rocket, and the equally loose 
French-white one—not French Rocket or English either, 
though it may be Scotch—frequently come from the seeds 
of the single Hesperis, and are, therefore, scarcely worth the 
trouble of propagating by cutLings, or otherwise, any more 
than most of tho Ton - week - stocks ; not so, however, 
the old and densely-spiked double white Rocket, which is 
now so nearly extinct, in this part of the country at least, 
that I could only procure one small tiny plant of it this 
season, in one of the most extensive nursery grounds in the 
West of Scotland, and this I am afraid will not stand over 
the winter, as it continues to retain only its one single ray 
of leaves in contra-distinction to the former alongside of it, 
which, in less than six weeks, has become a close many- 
rayed tuft, from a couple of inches of this year's llower- 
stem, carelessly thrust into the open ground up to its single 
leaf and axillary bud.— M. D. Edwin, Glasgow." 
SIZE OF POTS. 
“ What does Mr. Beaton mean, at page 374, by ‘ full-sized 
pots ?’ What size ?—Verax.” 
[That size which is sufficient to keep the Geranium for five 
or ten years on Harry Moore’s plan. One kind of Geranium 
requires a pot three times larger than another; tho smaller 
pot is full-size, just as much as a larger one; a thumb-pot is 
a full-sized pot for some few plants. We never give the 
exact size of a pot for a specimen plant, because there is no 
rule on the subject.] 
PLANTING PTERIS AQUILINA. 
“ I think your correspondent ‘ H. L.,’ in The Cottage 
Gardener for to-day, No. 312, who wishes to make a planta¬ 
tion of the Pteris aquilina, will succeed bettor by trans¬ 
planting tho roots than sowing the spores ; as, by the latter 
method, he will have to wait a considerable time before the 
plants are worthy tho name of such. 
“ I have always found the roots'very tenacious of life, par¬ 
ticularly when growing in sandy peat, and when such soil 
has been used for making beds for American plants, Ac., 
with the roots of Fern growing naturally in it, if great care 
has not been taken to thoroughly eradicate them, a plan¬ 
tation of P. aquilina is then formed when not wanted.— 
T.W.AV.” 
POULTRY. 
BUENOS AYRES DUCKS. 
“ On referring to the reports of various poultry-shows, I 
notice that in the class ‘ for any other variety of Ducks,’ 
frequent mention is made of the ‘ Buenos Ayres ’ or 
‘ Labrador ' breed. Would you oblige me by saying if there 
are two distinct varieties of Ducks having these two appella¬ 
tions, or whether, in accordance with what I have always 
understood, the two varieties are one, and that the name 
‘ Buenos Ayres’ is that by which they are rightly called, that 
of ‘ Labrador’ being wrongly applied? On looking into Mr. 
Dixon’s work on Poultry, I see lie says they are called 
‘Labrador,’ ‘Buenos Ayres,’ or ‘Black East-Indian.’ He 
entirely discards the claim of Labrador to furnish us with 
any new variety of tame Ducks, and believing that our tame 
Ducks are importations from the east, he gives the pre¬ 
ference to the Indian title, as nothing is more probable than 
that we received them from the east, vid Buenos Ayres. I 
am anxious to know something more respecting these 
Ducks, as I have two apparently distinct varieties ; I mean, 
as regards their form and general appearance. One variety 
is very small, and has thin, taper necks, with very small 
beaks ; the other, besides being larger, has the neck much 
thicker, and carries the tail more erect; while in my smaller 
birds it is less elevated, and rather pointed to the ground.— 
An Old Subscriber, Taunton." 
[There is but one variety of these birds, which arc con¬ 
stantly miscalled “ Labrador.” Mr. Dixon’s reasoning 
against such an appellation seems conclusive ; and the only 
cause for the error appears to exist in the fact, that the 
Velvet Scoter, “Anasfusea,” an oceanic Duck of remarkably 
brilliant black plumage, abounds on that part of the North 
American coast. We have little doubt of their East Indian 
origin, whence they might readily have been transmitted to 
Buenos Ayres. But Black East Indian seems the fittest 
designation with our present knowledge of the original geo¬ 
graphical disposition of this species. Of your two varieties 
we should certainly be inclined to regard the smaller and 
more delicately-formed as the pure race, though we speak 
with diffidence in-such cases, from not having tho advantage 
of personal inspection. It has been a very general remark 
among poultry judges, that these East Indian ducks have 
greatly deteriorated of late, in no point, perhaps, more con¬ 
spicuously so than with regard to their form, which has lost, 
in many instances, the symmetry and elegance which, in 
addition to the extreme beauty of their plumage, rendered 
them such general favourites a few years since. The coarse 
neck and bill, especially, are tokens of such degeneracy, 
which, in some cases that have come before us, has evidently 
been attributable to crosses with a common black duck. 
Their properties and characteristics are stated at length at 
page 290 of “ The Poultry Book.”] 
WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE CRYSTAL 
PALACE ? 
This is a question that has been frequently put and answered 
during tho course of every twenty-four hours which have 
passed away since the doors of the Palace were thing wide 
for the public to view its many and varied contents. We 
may safely assert that the preponderating answers to this 
question have been approvatory; but we have heard many 
which aro of a doubtful nature. 
