June 12.] 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
161 
“ Peaches disbud, Sc." —Most likely all necessary dis¬ 
budding will have been carried out long since in-doors. 
The stopping of gross shoots, however, must he persisted 
in until the end of their growth; and we deem it good 
practice to stop a considerable amount of the young 
shoots, which have attained some length, just about the 
period when the last swelling begins. It tends to in¬ 
crease the substance of the principal leaves; and on the 
robust character of these depends, in no small degree, 
the size and flavour of the fruit. Moreover, it induces 
a more early ripeness in the wood, and, by consequence, 
a more decided rest; and, also, throws a little power 
into the inferior shoots, which should be left growing 
until the very last, in order to draw sap into them. 
“ Strawberries turn out, Sc.” —It is astonishing what 
very nice crops of strawberries are sometimes produced 
from plants of the later forcings, not but the early ones 
might answer, but the fact is, few pei’sons can find house 
or pit room for the plants after the fruit is gathered; and, 
like pot-bulbs when done blooming, it will not do to 
throw them aside at random. To do justice to them, 
they should be preserved in a pit or frame, hardened by 
degrees, and supplied with liquid manure. The later 
forced lots, however, will scarcely turn out of their house 
quarters until May; and then, if they have not been 
coddled, they will stand in any snug corner, if well 
supplied with moisture. In a fortnight or three weeks 
they may he planted out finally, without disturbing 
their ball ; and they should have a rich and fine soil. 
We are not aware if any other kind will succeed so well 
as the Keen’s seedling ; these are notorious for producing 
fine fruit; at the same time it must be admitted, that 
since such late strawberries as the Elton have been 
better understood, there has been less occasion for such 
a procedure. 
“ Ventilate Freely, Sc." —Above all the evils most to 
be deprecated as to in-door things, what is termed 
“ burning,” is perhaps the worst. Starving, or, in other 
words, too low a temperature, may be got over; but 
burning leaves its effects manifest for a very long time, 
especially with such things as the vine. We have a 
metallic vinery here, that, do what we will, burns less or 
more, and has done every year for these twenty years, 
and certainly not for want of the means of ventilation ; 
for every other back-light slides nearly half-way down, 
and every front sash opens wide. Now this house has, 
the whole of this spring, had air given liberally before 
6 a.m., and, at nine o’clock, the whole ventilation of 
which the house is capable is given, with the end door 
set wide open. Nevertheless, two of the vines in the 
centre are slightly damaged again, although it was pre¬ 
determined in the spring to run the utmost risk of star¬ 
vation, in order to avoid this plague. This evil is, 
doubtless, in the glass itself, for there is nothing peculiar 
in the roof (albeit metallic), which is at an angle of 60°. 
Many a poor wight of a gardener has, doubtless, in¬ 
curred heavy displeasure, and undergone a great severity 
of feeling, through a similar case, when entirely beyond 
his control,—for this world is not particularly careful to 
place the saddle on the right horse. In such houses, it 
is, doubtless, a justifiable course to shade even vines, if 
canvass can be spared; this, however, must only be for 
three hours on very sunny days, at most, as the shading 
would soon do serious mischief to a plant so dependent 
on light as the vine. R. Errington. 
THE ELOWER-GARDEN. 
Botanical Borders. —A lady has written to us saying, 
that she “ wished very much to have in her garden a 
hardy plant of every natural order that contains hardy 
plants;” and adding, “ perhaps you would kindly put 
me in the way to accomplish this plan by giving a list 
of those orders of which hardy specimens can be grown 
as representatives of their class ?” Although this is not 
quite a new idea among amateurs, it is as bold, and, in 
some sense, as comprehensive as that which ended in 
the Great Exhibition itself; and if we could enlist 
“ foreign commissioners ” to send us over such plants 
and seeds as we could mention by name, I can see no 
difficulty in getting up representative collections in the 
gardens of all those who may be desirous to arrange 
part of their grounds for that purpose. If I had plenty 
of money, and a large family to bring up and educate, 
I certainly would have a border of representative plants 
for the young ones to learn a general knowledge of plants 
and botany from, as part of a liberal education. At one 
end of this border I would have a summer-house, which 
I would provide with the elementary books on the dif¬ 
ferent departments of natural history; also, as many 
shells, stuffed birds, and dried insects as would exemplify 
the best methods of their classification; so that when 
the boys got out mto the world, and travelled—may be 
in foreign parts, after some honest calling—they could 
write me home such letters as I should not be ashamed 
to send to the newspapers or periodicals to amuse or in- 
sti'uct the rising generation, instead of proclaiming them¬ 
selves dunces, as nine-tenths of the authors of “ foreign 
travels ” do now-a-days, who cannot describe the differ¬ 
ence between a donkey and a March hare, let alone 
plants. Mixed borders of herbaceous plants, including 
bulbs, if carefully planted according to some natural 
arrangement, would have a meaning, and be very useful 
as domestic schools of botany, as well as interesting 
scenes at present; for gay they are not, nor can be, 
according to our notions of gayness in a flower-garden. 
One plant from every order containing hardy ones, as 
suggested by our correspondent, will give us but a very 
faint idea of a natural arrangement of herbaceous plants. 
Mr. Loudon once collected an assortment on that plan, 
which I had examined one day with himself, my kind- 
hearted friend, and I told him on the spot they were no 
better than “ Love’s Labour lost.” He had them arranged 
according to the system of Decandolle, beginning with 
the Crowfoots (Ranunculaceae), our own field buttercups 
being the most familiar to us of the whole of them. But 
neither a buttercup, nor any other plant in the order, is 
sufficient of itself to give a new beginner an insight into 
the varied forms assumed by the Crowfoots, although 
they do not vary from each other half so much as those 
of many other orders. To meet this difficulty, and to 
render the study of plants more easy to the unlearned 
botanists, we now-a-days divide the great natural orders 
into small groups, as farmers do their cattle when they 
send them to the shows to try for prizes. Now, it a 
man were tosend six head of cattle to the “ Home park,” 
next July, for competition, all in one lot, and that the 
first cow was of the Hereford breed—the handsomest 
breed of any, apart from the Dunrobin black high¬ 
landers—the next a sprawling-headed Devonshire, the 
third an Alderney, the fourth a short-horn, and the fitth 
| and sixth without any horns at all; why ! the judges 
would think the man was beside himself. He ought to 
put up six of one breed, as the breeders say; but even 
with a sample of six “ breeds,” a person coming over to 
the Exhibition from some unknown part of the world, 
where cows were never heard of, would have much to 
learn about our milkers, even after studying the pecu¬ 
liarities of the whole six. But let us suppose that this 
stranger could only see one cow, and that a Suffolk dun, 
without horns, he would never make a cowman from all 
he could learn by this sample; and it is just the same 
with attempting to learn botany, or the natural arrange¬ 
ment of plants, by single specimens of each order. 
Large orders, similar to the Cow order, are all, like it, 
divided into breeds, and to have any thing like a good 
notion of any one order, you ought to have at least one 
