280 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
July 17. 
shreds, for the million, or for general use. As a Rose-house 
climber, or for a cool conservatory, or an orchard-house 
kind of treatment, we have recommended it, and always will, 
j All these yellow Roses want more sun to ripen the wood ; 
| our climate never does that, nor produce such yellow Roses 
as one sees in the south of France. We would not try expe¬ 
riments with your line specimen of this Rose—better let well 
alone, and clothe the bottom with some other Rose. We 
cannot say if Jamie Desprez would do in a greenhouse. 
There is not the smallest fear about all the details for 
, striking cuttings by the Waltoman case not being furnished i 
i in due time; and there is as little fear about its answering j 
J perfectly; hut it is a very different thing to warn inventors, 
! which is all we then intended, and to arrive at a just conclu- 
I sion on an invention all at once. Suppose an experiment 
was necessary to decide some point in the management of 
Mr. Walton’s case, such could be of little use in the height 
of summer. Pray have more patience, and go to no more 
expense for such tilings till you see the full details; but 
all the details are not settled yet.] 
IS HUMEA ELEGANS A BIENNIAL? 
“ Having been a visitor at the late Liverpool Exhibition 
of Plants, tfec., during my observations there came under I 
my notice a collection of eight stove or greenhouse plants, 
disqualified on account of a large plant of Hume a eleguns 
being one of the number; a noble specimen, indeed, 
measuring ten feet in height and six yards in circumference, 
with about twenty branches coming away from the main 
stem, each branch averaging three feet six inches of flower, 
and some brandies with flower almost to the pot edge. ; 
I have searched The Collage Gardeners' Dictionary , and find 
it therein stated to be a greenhouse biennial. 1 should feel 
deeply obliged to you if you would give me your opinion, 
^through the medium of your interesting work, The 
Cottage Gardener, at the earliest convenient oppor¬ 
tunity.—A Constant Reader, Liverpool.” 
(Humea elegans is a greenhouse plant and a biennial. If 
the leaves wore in good health on the plant you mention, 
the grower deserved an extra prize for it; but to place it 
among a collection of stove and greenhouse plants was 
injudicious; as, although strictly a plant not sufficiently hardy 
to stand the winter, it is never entered into competition 
with greenhouse plants. Balsams, Coxcombs, Hydrangeas, 
Ilumeas, Salpiglossis, ^Sehizantbus, Salvias, and some others 
of that stamp, are beautiful things, and some of them, 
including the Humea, require far more skill to bring them 
to perfection than any of the usual run of stove and green¬ 
house plants seen at exhibitions; yet, that is not the 
question, which turns round and round like other fashions ; 
but whether Humea , as a greenhouse plant, is fit to be 
associated with “ greenhouse plants ’’ for competition ? It is 
not so, and never was, except, perhaps, in some obscure 
village. As a single specimen of rare horticultural skill, we 
have often awarded a medal for a Humea, worth four times 
the actual value of the plant; but we should have no hesita¬ 
tion in disqualifying a “ collection ” for it.—I). B.] 
HETEROPTERYS NIT1DA CULTURE—VITTADINIA 
LOBATA HARDY. 
“ You will oblige by giving a description of the shrub 
Heteroptcrgs nitida, and its cultivation. Also, the name of a 
book treating about Australian shrubs. The Vittadinia 
\ lob ala (Australian Daisy) has lived out the past winter, and 
j is now growing very strong with me. 1 mention this, in case 
. any of your readers would like to know it, as a doubt was 
expressed of its being more than an annual, or of its being 
j hardy,—M.” 
I [Heteroptcrgs nitida is a tall-growing shrub, from the 
Brazils, with yellow flowers, not generally known nor culti¬ 
vated. It requires the ordinary treatment of stove shrubs ; 
that is, a heat of 6o° to 75° in summer, and 10° lower 
in winter. It grows well in sandy loam and peat, mixed 
with half-decayed leaves and pieces of charcoal. 
It is propagated by cuttings of half-ripened wood put. into 
a pot halt-filled with crocks, and upon them a layer of the 
compost made very firm to within an inch of the top of the 
pot—that inch to be filled with the best silver sand that can 
be got. Then plant the cuttings, water them, and in an 
hour’s time place over them a bell-glass Jhjgh and wide 
enough to enclose without touching every leaf.’ 
We are glad to learn that the pretty little Vittadinia lobata 
has proved hardy with you. There is no work lately pub¬ 
lished on Australian Plants. The only one we know is that 
by li. Sweet, published in 1828, under the name Flora 
Australasica. ] 
ONION GRUB—BUMBLE-FOOTED COCK. 
“I have three beds of Onions, sown the third week in 
April, which have done exceedingly well till the last fortnight, 
when I found they began to die oil', here and there one, and 
to my astonishment, last evening, on drawing one that was 
going off, I found no less than seven or eight maggot grubs 
in the bulb, a sufficient reason for their failing so fast. What 
must I do to save those that are not attacked ? shall I 
transplant to another part of my garden ? and can I do 
anything to destroy the maggot, which I suppose is the 
grub of the Onion Fly? 
“I had a Cochin-China cock given me last week, with a 
very bad foot, and on examination, I found a hole penetrating 
between the toes and extending far back into the sole, which 
was much swollen, and on cleaning out the wound discharged 
a quantity of matter, which is again accumulating. What is 
the disease, and what the remedy? I fear an injury at 
first.— Amateur.” 
[You will have seen what was said about the Onion GruJ) 
in our last number. 
Your Cochin-China fowl is bumble-footed. It often arises 
from treading violently on sharp stones. The following is 
said of this disease in The Poultry Book : “ In very early 
cases we have removed the tumours and cauterized the part 
successfully with Nitrate of Silver (Lunar Caustic); but the 
adoption of low, broad perches, which prevent the birds 
coming with violence to the grouud when descending is the 
best remedy, inasmuch, as that prevention is better than 
cure in all cases.”] 
THE NATURAL HISTORY OE GUANO. 
(Concluded from page 192.) 
To stand at a distance and observe the movements of the 
birds in these rookeries is not only amusing, but edifying, 
and even affecting. The camp appears in continual motion, 
all appear engaged in seeking pleasure, refreshment, or 
recreation ; at the same time the air is almost darkened by 
an immense number of albatrosses, and other birds, 
hovering over the rookery like a dense cloud, some con¬ 
tinually lighting and meeting their companions, while others 
are continually rising and shaping their course for the sea. 
Sea-fowl in incalculable flocks are observed to congregate 
for similar purposes everywhere on the desolate and craggy 
shores and islands of both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans ; 
and although the same species of birds are met with in 
many different latitudes, whose food is alike, and whose 
droppings can vary little in chemical character, whether this 
relates to their solubility, fluidity, or solidity, yet, as far - as it 
has been discovered, there seems only very few situations 
where matter resembling guano, in any quantity, is found. 
The rocky islands and shores on the northren and western 
coast of Scotland, although they have been no doubt 
frequented for thousands of years by birds in countless 
numbers, yet are really known not to have any such deposit 
upon them ; neither does it exist on the lonely islands in 
the Gulf of St. Lawrence, nor on the rocky shores of North 
America, in the higher latitudes, to which also vast flocks of 
sea-fowl migrate every season, to rear their young in fancied 
security, amidst an abundant supply of food, and where 
vessel-loads of their eggs are collected by visitors, by whom no 
report has as yet ever been made of the existence of guano. 
It must be inferred, from the acute and searching talent 
which Morrell shows for observation, that he would not 
I have allowed the occurrence of guano on the Falkland 
Island, or on others equally the resort of sea-fowl, to have 
I escaped him had it existed. Ho would have recorded the 
