September 20,] 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
WEEKLY CALENDAR. 
389 
I 
nr 
l) 
w 
D 
SEPT. 26—OCT. 2, 1850. 
Weather near London 
in 1849. 
Sun 
Rises. 
Sun 
Sets. 
Moon 
R. & S. 
Moon’s 
Age. 
Clock 
bef.Sun. 
Day of 
Year. 
26 
Tn 
St. Cyprian. Elm leaves orange. 
T, 6;°—55°. 
E. 
54 a. 5 
8 
37 
20 
8 
38 
269 
27 
F 
Hawthorn leaves tawny yellow. 
T. 76°—51°. 
E. 
Fine. 
55 
47 
9 
18 
21 
8 
58 
270 
28 
S 
T. 68°—51°. 
s.w. 
5 7 
44 
10 
7 
© 
0 
18 
271 
29 
Son 
16 Sun. aft. Trinity. Michaelmas Day. 
T. 68°—55°. 
s.w. 
Rain. 
59 
42 
11 
8 
23 
9 
38 
272 
30 
M 
St. Jerome. 
T. 62°—50°. 
s.w. 
Co 
40 
'morn. 
24 
Q 
57 
273 
1 
Tu 
Hornbeam leaves yellow. Remigius. 
T. 57°—45°. 
N.E. 
Rain. 
VI 
V 
’ 0 
16 
25 
10 
1 7 
274 
W 
Walnut leaves fall. 
T. 55°—38°. 
N.E. 
Rain. 
4 
35 
i 
32 
26 
10 
36 
275 
On the 1 st of October, in the year 1819, and in the 86 th year of his 
age, died one of the best of practical gardeners— William Speech ley. 
His name is associated with the superior cultivation of the pine-apple 
and the grape vine, and with no more than justice, because those who 
know the volumes he wrote upon the proper modes of growing them, and 
who also know the essays upon the same plants that Had been published 
previously, will readily appreciate how much the gardening world were 
indebted to him. The fruit of the pine-apple had been made known in 
England in 1657; for an embassage returning from China, in that year, 
appears to have brought pine-apples thence as a present to Oliver 
Cromwell. John Nieuhoff, who was secretary to the embassy, describes 
the fruit very correctly ; and Evelyn, in his “ Diary,” under the date of 
9 th August, 1(561, says, “ I first saw the famous Queen pine brought from 
Barbadoes, and presented to his Majesty (Charles II.); but the first that 
were ever seen in England were those sent to Cromwell four years since.” 
It may be that from the crowns of this, and of others mentioned by 
Evelyn as sent to the king from the West Indies in 1668, that Mr. John 
Rose, his Majesty’s gardener, succeeded in raising a fruit of the pine¬ 
apple in this country. We say it maybe, because there is a portrait in 
oil colours of Rose, at Kensington Palace, representing him giving a pine¬ 
apple to Charles II. Rose was then gardener to the Duchess of Cleve¬ 
land, and the garden in which the present is being made was that at her 
Grace’s seat, Downey Court, Buckinghamshire. If Rose was thus suc¬ 
cessful. the culture of the pine-apple soon became a lost art; and it was 
not until 1 718 that it was really established in this country by Mr. H. 
Telende, gardener to Sir Matthew Decker, at Richmond, in Surrey. 
In 1767 , John Giles, atone time gardener to Lady Boyd, at Lewisham, 
in Kent, and afterwards foreman to Messrs. Russell, nurserymen in that 
village, published “Ananas, or a Treatise on the Pine-apple; ” and in 
1769 appeared another on the same subject, entitled, “ A Treatise on the 
Ananas or Pine-apple,” the author of which was Mr. Adam Taylor, gar¬ 
dener to J. Sutton, Esq, of New York, near Devizes. He claims for 
himself the merit of being the first who brought the fruit to an improved 
size and excellence without the aid of fire heat. A coloured engraving of 
the pine-apple is prefixed to the volume; and if this be the improved 
size then attained its predecessors must have been small indeed, for it is 
only six pips high. That this was so we may conclude from the drawing 
of a pine-apple, published in 1733 by a gardener at Kensington named 
Furber, and this is only four pips in height. 
In 1779 appeared Mr. Speechley’s Treatise on the Culture of the Pine¬ 
apple, and is so far superior in every respect to the two preceding publi¬ 
cations, that until within these few years it was the best guide to which the 
amateur could refer, and certainly led the way to the improved pine culture 
now practised. The same may be said of his work on the grape vine. 
Here, as in the case of the pine-apple, the leader was John Rose, gar- 
dener to Charles II., for he published his “English Vineyard Vindicated” 
in 1675 . It is dedicated to the “merry monarch ; ” and in the dedication 
Rose says, “ I know your Majesty can have no great opinion of our 
English wines as hitherto they have been ordered, but it is not altogether 
from defect of the climate, at least not in all places ; and that if my 
directions be followed that precious liquor may once again recover its just 
estimation, though the product of your Majesty’s dominions,” Switzer, 
in his “ Practical Fruit Gardener,” published in 1724, incorporates 
the chief part of Rose’s work already noticed, but adds much valuable 
information from his own practice and knowledge. He says that it is to 
Lord Capel and Sir William Temple we are indebted for the introduction 
from the Continent of some of our best varieties of the grape—Sir 
William having brought into England the C-hasselas, Parsley-leaved, 
Frontignac, Amboyse, Burgundy, Black Muscat, and Grizly Frontignac. 
The building of sloping walls about this time, Switzer says, led the world 
to the improvement of “ glassing and forcing grapes.” The Duke of 
Rutland had the walls heated by Hues, and “ glassed them all before as 
you do stoves, whieh penned in the heat to a great degree; and from this 
they had good success.” Switzer suggested that the roots also should 
be kept warmer, and this was immediately effected by a flue passed under 
the border. The success was then more complete. 
It is needless to trace in detail the progress of vine culture further, for 
we have now brought its history down to the time of Miller and others, 
who still rank among modern horticultural authorities. The first edition 
of Miller’s Dictionary appeared in 1/31, and contains moderately full 
directions for the cultivation of the vine. In the following year Sir 
Alexander Murray published “The Nature and Method of Planting, &c., 
a Vineyard,” a work containing mueh useful information. Hitt’s stan¬ 
dard work on “ Fruit Trees ” appeared in 1755; Abercrombie’s “Hot¬ 
house Gardener,” and other works, between 1774 and 1790, and these, 
with some others of minor note, gave way to Speechley’s Treatise on the 
Culture of the Vine , which issued from the press in 1/89* This is still a 
work of good authority. These were his principal works, and of a third, 
the offspring of his old age— Practical Hints in Domestic literal 
Economy —we may hereafter have occasion to speak. One who seems to 
have been a relative has furnished the few particulars usually found in 
the biography of one “ who knows 
no care beyond the garden walls.” 
He was born at a village near 
Peterborough, in Northampton¬ 
shire, the son of a respectable 
farmer, who gave him that best of 
dowries, a sound education ; and 
the seed was cast upon good 
ground, for he had the first essen¬ 
tials of success—a powerful mind 
and strenuous industry. From 
early youth he selected gardening 
as his path to competency ; and 
after being made free of i the 
stoke hole ’ at Milton Abbey, now 
Earl Fitzwilliam’s, advancing to a 
better position at Castle Howard, 
Earl Carlisle’s, and being head 
gardener to Sir W. St. Quentin, 
he finally attained the same office 
at Welbeck, in Nottinghamshire, 
the Duke of Portland’s. He re¬ 
signed this situation to occupy a 
farm at Woodborough Hall, left 
vacant by the death of his younger 
son ; this was followed by the death 
of his elder son in 1804 ; and soon 
after Mr. Speechley adjourned to 
nearer London, to be in the vici¬ 
nity of the last survivor of his 
family. He died at Great Milton, 
in Oxfordshire. 
RANGE OF BAROMETER—RAIN IN INCHES. 
Sept. 
1841. 
1842. 
1843. 
1844. 
1845. 
1846. 
1847. 
1848. 
1849. 
26 
B. 
/ 29.480 j 
29.906 
30.038 
30.270 
29-985 
29736 
30.237 
29.650 
29.843 
X 29.422 ! 
29795 
29.947 
30.198 
29740 
29700 
30.130 
29.514 
29 .S 07 
R. 
0.27 
0.08 
— 
— 
— 
0.05 
0.24 
2 7 
B. 
f 29.567 
29 929 
29.781 
30.179 
29.914 
29.763 
30.276 
29702 
29.763 
I 29 . 47 I 
29.859 
29.681 
30.096 
29790 
29 723 
30.260 
29.666 
29.723 
R. 
0.57 1 
0.27 
— 
— 
0.02 
0.25 
— 
0.01 
28 
B. 
t 29.381 j 
30.059 
29.834 
30.047 
29.937 
29.557 
30.323 
29738 
29.825 
t 29.310 
30.047 
29.735 
29.934 
29-854 
29-513 
30.297 
29.723 
29730 
R. 
0.15 
— 
— 
0.05 
— 
0.09 
0.80 
0.07 
B. 
129.267 
30.093 
29.968 
30.219 
29.949 
29.447 
30.310 
29.677 
29.678 
129.167 
30.026 
29-937 
29.961 
29.753 
29.391 
30.235 
29.669 
29.497 
R. 
0.35 
0.04 
0.24 
0.01 
0.06 
0.01 
— 
0.2 7 
0.46 
30 
B. 
r 29.413 
30.150 
29.893 
30.328 
29.800 
29.800 
30.24T 
29.790 
29.216 
129.172 1 
30.138 
29.788 
30.242 
29704 
29.618 
30.117 
29.691 
29.184 
R. 
0.11 
0.01 
0.01 
— 
0.01 
— 
— 
0.09 
0.37 
B 
r 29.598 
30.257 
29.999 
30.109 
29.946 
29.929 
30.050 
29.681 
29.598 
129.421 
30.200 
29.926 
29.962 
29.844 
29.966 
29.995 
29.673 
29.427 
R. 
0.20 
— 
— 
— 
0.03 
— 
— 
— 
0.02 
B 
/ 29 . 77 s i 
30.300 
30.099 
29.795 
29.874 
29785 
30.110 
29.688 
29.723 
129.730 
30.149 
29.999 
29.561 
29.680 
29.610 
30.039 
29.604 
29.686 
R. 
- 
— 
0.11 
— 
0.07 
0.44 
— 
0.03 
0.12 
729.792 1 
30.089 
30.138 
29.830 
29.594 
29700 
30.164 
29.910 
29.540 
3 
129.745 
30.010 
30.061 
29-758 
29.510 
29.657 
30.124 
29.711 
29 . 20 C 
R. 
0.13 ; 
| 
0.01 
0.17 
0.02 
0.04 
1.01 
Insects. —Such de¬ 
struction was recently 
occasioned to some va¬ 
luable carpets of a 
friend, by what house¬ 
keepers emphatically 
call “ The Moth,” that 
we determined to give 
some relative particu¬ 
lars, more especially as 
wc are able to add a 
most simple preventive 
of their ravages, name¬ 
ly, spreading a thin 
layer of hay between 
the floor and the carpet. There are two moths the larvse of which are 
thus destructive— Tinea tapetzella, the tapestry, or black-cloaked woollen 
moth ; and T. pellionella , the fur, or single-spotted woollen moth. They 
both arc destructive to carpets and other woollens, but the larvse of the 
latter moth is especially fond of ladies* furs, “paying no more respect to 
the regal ermine than to the w'oollen habiliments of the poor.” This 
moth is represented magnified in our drawing. Its fore-wings are ashy 
brown, slightly clouded, glossy, with a black dot on the disc before the 
middle ; hind-wings, pale ashy brown. 
Meteorology. —We give eight days this time to complete the year. 
The average highest and lowest temperatures, from observations at Chis¬ 
wick during the last twenty-three years, are 64.4° and 45°, respectively. 
During the period there were 89 fine days, and 95 on which rain fell. 
The greatest heat during the time was 80°, and greatest cold 24°. 
No. CIV., Vol. IV. 
