4G the COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, October 23, 1860. 
CULTURE OP PERN'S IN BASKETS. 
I AM glad to observe that my communication in your No. 
of the 25th of September has attracted the notice of Mr. J. A. 
Summers on the subject of growing greenhouse Ferns in baskets 
instead of earthen pots. Rut I think we scarcely understand 
each other, as I was quite aware there was no novelty in the use 
of wide suspended baskets for the purpose, and very pretty these 
are. My idea, however, was, I think, an original one; for I had 
tio P'here seen what, for distinction’s sake, maybe called basket- 
pots, Oi precisely the form of the common brick ones—not 
necessarily suspended at all, but by me ranged on shelves, cither 
with or without saucers. To my view the appearance infinitely 
surpasses a collection of dingy red eyesores, and your corre¬ 
spondent quite confirms my statement as to their superior suit¬ 
ableness for the intended object; for not only are Ferns more 
' healthy, but I believe other plants would be equally improved 
h placed in them. I am well acquainted with what have been 
facetiously called crinoline baskets of galvanised wire, and these 
fil'C very well in their way, but do not come up to my idea Of 
pots at'all, for my purposes, at least, and are somewhat more 
expensive. I gave a common garden-pot to a basket-maker, 
and desired him to make the same tiling in wickerwork, 5 o be 
painted inside and out—green, I think, looking best; but this is a 
matter of taste. My first specimens were somewhat more < ostly 
than I liked, but that difficulty was got over by putting the 
work into the hands of the blind operatives in this line at the 
depbt for the sale of their productions, established by the 
“Association for Promoting the General Welfare of the Dlind,” 
127, Euston Road, London, NW. Not only was it well and 
cheaply done, but I had the satisfaction of knowing that I had 
introduced amongst an unfortunate class of fellow creatures a 
new description of articles of a simple kind, which could be 
made at their own homes. This Institution well deserves 
support, and all information may be obtained on application to 
the intelligent superintendent, Mr. W. II. Levy, as above, who 
will know them under the designation of-“basket Fern pots.” 
Those hitherto made have been of five-inch size ; but any gar¬ 
dening pot left as a guide will be imitated as to dimensions, 
prices varying according to circumstances.—T. 
TEOPiEOLUMS—GAZANIA SPLENDENS. 
BEDDING-OUT PLANTS NEAR CLAY CROSS. 
I hate just read Mr. Beaton’s article on Tropteolura and 
Gazania splendens, and can fully bear out his remarks about 
pouring cold water on splendens. I will give a case in point. 
Calling in August at a certain nursery where everything appeared 
to be done well, I was asked, “Do you know anything of Gazania 
splendens ?” “ Yes, I know it very well. It is one of the best 
things I know.” “Well, what difference is there in it and 
rigens?” “A great deal; it is larger, better formed, broader 
petaled, has a beautifully marked ring round the petals, and a 
clear yellow centre, while rigens has a dark disc or centre.” 
“ Well, come here and look. These I have bought from Messrs. 
Hendersons, and planted them in the same bed, and here they 
are. Now, where is the difference ? It is only humbugging the 
country, for this thing has been here for years, and we have sold 
it for rigens.” Sure enough, it was splendens in its glory for the 
season, the whole bed! I only remarked that his customers need 
not grumble if they had been receiving that for years instead of 
rigens ; and I should like to know why, if he had the opportunity, 
he did not embrace it before Messrs. E. G. Henderson. I feel 
assured, that those who have it true will not say they humbugged 
the country, but they deserve all they have gamed by it for 
bringing it before the public. It has not done here so well as 
some other places, the season has been against it. Cold rains 
and blustering winds on these bleak hills have prevented all 
things doing as they should have done. We have uot had one 
entire week of fine weather during this summer. 
Of Tropeeolum elegans I can prove that there is more than one 
variety in the trade. There is a bed here of the variety called 
the Crystal Palace one. The plants were raised from cuttings 
late in the spring from plants received from Mr. Summers, and, 
notwithstanding the fearful weather we have had, it has been a 
perfect mass of bloom from the middle of June, and is the only 
thing which has done well and stood the weather, with tl e ex¬ 
ception of our seedling Petunias which have been and are i ow a 
sheet of bloom—viz., ^William ILindley, dark-speckled j urple 
and puce; Jenny, white, violet throat; alba magna, a large 
white, in the character of magna coccinea, with one or two 
others. But I am leaving elegans. We received a plant of one 
under that name from another place, and it is the worst variety 
of Lobbianum I ever saw. I would, therefore, caution pur¬ 
chasers next season to see that they purchase only of growers who 
will warrant the best or true kind; for it would be waste of money 
and cause disappointment, and Mr. Beaton would have enough 
to do to quiet the grumblers, if they received such a worthless 
thing as I am alluding to. 
I was not aware until I read Mr. Beaton’s article that Lobbia¬ 
num is difficult to manage in blooming during the winter. I 
used some seven or eight years since to have at all times plenty 
of it to cut for bouquets ; and I wanted plenty where I then 
lived to supply our customers. I grew them the same as I shall 
do this winter a plant or two of elegans. They have been 
growing out of doors all the summer in a 48-sized pot. The 
wood is short-jointed, hard, and ripe. Yon would say it was 
stunted in growth. It is now under cover ; and as soon as a new 
bed of fermenting material is made up it will be plunged in that 
after being shifted into a 24-sized pot, when it will commence 
growing and flowering the whole of the winter and spring. I 
know a nobleman’s gardener who is adopting the same plan. 
And so, after all Mr. Beaton has said, and people being almost 
crazed about obtaining the Trentham Scarlet, or Crystal Palace 
Scarlet, or Beaton’s Seedling Scarlet Geranium, &c., it has all 
ended in a bottle of smoke, or, to use the words of a contemporary, 
“ it is as old as the hills but, if I mistake not, that writer is 
the same person that brought Tom Thumb before the public in 
the first place. Now, if my supposition is correct, will he be 
kind enough to say who was the raiser of Prizefighter, which, 
he says, Crystal Palace Scarlet is ? Or will Mr. Beaton say if he 
ever sent or knew of his seedling ever being sent to Heckfield ? or 
will Mr. Cole, who I know w r as at Slirubland some years since, 
say what he knows of the origin of it ? And will Mr. Fi'y give 
us any information as to where he obtained his stock in the first 
place P I find the same authority claims the honour of sending 
it to Sydenham in the first place, and then informs us that a 
certain party has sent out hundreds of Prizefighter instead of 
Crystal Palace ; and that the London trade has sent out thousands 
of it for Tom Thumb. To my mind it appears plain that it is a 
first-class thing, from the fact if I had no other, according to 
“ A. P. W.’s ” own showing, by the extraordinary demand there 
has been for it. Our stock of it was small this season; but I 
know it has done better than Tom Thumb, for that has been a 
total failure. We planted three times the same beds and yet 
could not make them grow. 
Dahlias here are very bad indeed : we have several hundreds 
that are not more than eighteen inches high at the present 
moment, and many will not bloom at all. 
Verbenas have done badly. Heliotropes, Calceolarias, Flower 
of the Day, Bouvardias, &c., the same. The liliputian Dahlias 
are worthy of being taken in hand more than they are. They 
bloom very freely, and are very pretty and useful for vases and 
small beds. Lobelias have not done well; the dwarf Nastur¬ 
tiums have bloomed well; the yellow and scarlet, if grown in 
pots, will be found very- useful for decorative purposes where a 
variety of flowers are wanted. 
I will give you in a future communication a list of Verbenas 
which have stood best here of the new and old kinds. 
I will just say in conclusion that Begonias did not do well, 
the ground being too cold. To-day the thermometer at twelve 
inches deep in the ground is 49° only, with rain from north and 
snow seen for the first time. 
Scarlet Geranium Vivid will be a first-class bedder. It 
surpasses in brilliancy any other out of doors this season.— 
Filshy Nurseries , near Clay Cross. 
A Revolution in Wine-Making. — A Professor of 
Chemistry in Charleston (Dr. Hume), it is said, has discovered a 
new process of wine-making in which fermentation is dispensed 
with, and the Grape juice changed in the course of forty-eight 
hours into a delicious wine, containing all the natural sweet¬ 
ness, flavour, and aroma of the fruit, and requiring neither 
sugar nor brandy to make it palatable. So completely and 
accurately are the characteristics of the Grape retained in the 
wine, that we are able at once to determine, on tasting, from 
what variety the juice was obtained ,—(Prairie Farmer.) 
