240 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[July 17. 
as it is, I must be content with saying, that throughout 
the season, that is, through July, August, and September, 
the flowering shoots will be cut down from time to time, 
as the first roses on them are past their best, without 
waiting for all the buds on every little side shoot to 
open. Some early-flowering shoots that have been so 
cut at the very end of June, are now in bloom from the 
next succession of shoots from below; and if all the 
eyes, down to the very bottom of the last year’s wood, 
do not break out into flowering branches at this first 
succession, the shoots will be nut down in August still 
lower, and then be in the same shape as they would 
have been at a winter pruning; that is, in effect, but 
not so in reality, as the shoots on any given plant are 
not to be all cut down at one time, but in succession. 
If this system does not injure the plants in the long 
run, and I do not think it will if the plants are kept 
well fed, the advantages I expect from it are flowers 
a week or ten days earlier in May, and four times 
as many flowers, at least, from the same plants in the 
course of one season. I think I can see conclusively, 
through this experiment, the utter folly and the 
unscientific bearing of the common practice of pruning 
roses in the spring in our climate, at least; and not only 
roses, but all other bushes or trees which cast their 
leaves in the autumn. As soon as the leaves are down 
is the proper time to prune, except in special cases ; and 
such cases do occur every season, and on both sides of 
what may be called the meridian time in pruning. On 
this side of the line, we all know that weak growing 
trees, or other plants, can be improved both in health 
and vigour by being pruned six weeks’ before the fall of 
the leaf, as had been long since proved on scientific 
grounds by Mr. Knight, and Mr. Williams, of Pitmaston, 
in the case of some fruit trees; and on the other side of 
the line, we are equally certain that it is right to put off 
the pruning season of some fruit and flowering plants, 
roses among the rest, till late in the spring; still, such 
exceptional cases do not weaken the general rule, or the 
principle of the practice. 
New Trees. —It may be interesting to the lovers of 
fine evergreen trees to hear that His Royal Highness 
Prince Albert planted the largest saleable plant in 
England, of the Chilian Arbor-vita; ( Libocedrus Chilen- 
sis), in the gardens here, to commemorate his first visit 
to Shrubland Park; that this noble evergreen tree 
attains the height of from 60 to 100 feet on the Andes 
of Chili; and that, although it has been known to bota¬ 
nists for some time, from the accounts of travellers and 
dried specimens, and also with Libocedrus tetragona, as 
the celebrated Alerce of Chili, so much valued for the 
excellence of its timber, it was only last season that 
the first seeds of it were procured in quantity by Mr. 
Low, nurseryman, at Clapton, near London—the only 
importer of it—and that through the exertions of a once 
Suffolk gardener, Mr. Thomas Bridges, to whose memory 
Sir W. Hooker dedicated the genus Bridgesia. It thus 
turns out, singularly enough, that the first plant from 
these seeds should be planted in Mr. Bridges’ native 
county; and that, too, by the most distinguished patron 
of science in this or in any other country. Mr. Bridges 
advises that this splendid tree should be planted over a 
dry bottom, and I can vouch for that condition having 
been fulfilled here to the letter. He also advises that 
very young plants of it should be slightly protected 
for the first winter or two, and, of course, we shall attend 
to his instructions. But Dr. Lindley and SirW. Hooker 
agree in considering it as hardy as the Araucaria irnbri- 
cata from the same country. Dr. Lindley, writing on 
this and the other Chilian Spruce, Libocedrus tetragona, 
says of them :—“ No doubt they are among the finest 
Conifers in the world.” 
After planting the Chilian Libocedar under the royal 
standard, which waved over our heads from the summit 
of the Albert Tower, a recent pile erected from the 
designs of Mr. Barry, His Royal Highness opened a 
conversation on the recent divisions into which the 
Conifers have been arranged by Endlicher and other 
botanists, and evinced such a thorough knowledge of 
the different sections as surprised even an old gardener, 
to say nothing of the workman-like manner in which he 
bandied the silver-mounted spade in the act of planting 
this fine tree, a biography of which had been prepared 
for his perusal. It turned out that His Royal Highness 
had little need of such aid respecting any of the recently- 
introduced trees to this country. A gentleman present¬ 
having expressed a wish that His Royal Highness 
might live to see the tree he had planted rear its head 
as high as the top of the flag-staff close by, he imme¬ 
diately instanced, in reply, the rapid growth of several 
species of Cypresses, and, among the rest, an avenue of 
Cypress near the city of Mexico, where some of the trees 
have attained the enormous height of nearly 300 feet. 
Altogether His Royal Higlmess’s remarks, conversation, 
and questions about our craft, have put some of us here 
to the blush; and I only wish that I could say or write 
in the same strain, so as to induce our rising race of 
gardeners to study, more than they usually do, the 
geography of the plants they cultivate, aud also their 
botanical arrangement, according to the best authors. 
Depend upon it, a young gardener has only put his foot 
on the first step of the ladder when he has received his 
gold medal for a collection of well-grown specimens. 
D. Beaton. 
GREENHOUSE AND WINDOW 
GARDENING. 
Altering Pits and Houses. —When in other sciences 
a new fact or principle is clearly demonstrated, the mind 
is often satisfied with contemplating it, and a sort of 
sluggish repose is apt to creep over it. Different, to a 
great extent, is it in gardening; and that difference seen 
in all, is most strikingly apparent in those who are just 
commencing their experimental aquaintance with it. 
Delightful it is to contemplate a beautiful flower in any 
case ; but the fact that we have reared and tended that 
lovely plant with our own hands, imparts a delight 
that the mere spectator admirer never can share. One 
of the charms of our art is, that the incitements to 
activity and progression are identical with motives to 
realize fresh and hitherto untasted delights. The man 
who cultivates, with zest, his potatoes and cabbages, will, 
every season, be adding a fresh vegetable to his lists. 
The rigid amateur, who at first can only see beauty in 
the perfected form of a few florists’ flowers, will, almost 
imperceptibly to himself, be ever and anon taking fresh 
protegees under his care. The mechanic, who tries his 
cucumbers out-of-doors, will first obtain calico and 
paper coverings, then a hand-light or small box, and then 
even the two-light box probably will not be the last of 
his achievements. To supply their windows, to decorate 
their flower-garden, our friends have provided themselves 
with pots, lesser and larger; but will they be satisfied 
with these? No; the desire to grow things better and 
larger, and to have them to look at as specimens in pots, 
instead of having a more limited collection in the flower- 
borders, oppresses them like a dream of fairy-land, and 
they resolve that such visions shall be realities, by con¬ 
structing greenhouses afresh, or turning the pits they 
already possess, with a little alteration, into such de¬ 
sirable receptacles. 
Hence, notwithstanding all that has been said re¬ 
specting the formation of pits, and the heating and 
building of houses, many queries from some of our 
friends continue to be presented; and, as likely to be 
generally interesting, one or two will be selected as the 
