77 
1HE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, November 6, 1860. 
trouble to find out the reason. In some places narrow houses made 
of tliin boards, not even closed at the joints, had been erected ; 
and in the climate of some parts of Scotland I was not surprised 
to hear that even the plants had been killed, knowing that near 
Glasgow Black Naples Currants and some varieties of Goose¬ 
berries are often killed to the ground. In others, provided with 
a heating apparatus, the gardener had placed large numbers of 
bedding plants, and given just “a little heat to keep out frost.” 
The flowers came out early ; the weather being very severe he 
could give no air—his blooms dropped ; the Peaches being 
crowded by plants, such as Calceolarias, Geraniums, &c., were 
covered with smother fly, and “ Mr. Rivers was a humbug, and 
orchard-houses all humbug too.” 
Another person had filled a house with Pears ; and though he 
had plenty of fruit, his master would not eat some and could 
not eat others. When I told these persons our sixty-feet house 
had for years produced from 100 to 150 dozen of Peaches and 
Nectarines, such as they had never tasted from an open wall, 
and that we never calculated on a failure as probable, I saw they 
thought me almost as great a humbug as Mr. Rivers; but we 
will leave these individuals with the remark that in a few years 
we believe those who build expensive walls in a bad climate to 
grow Peaches and Nectarines will be considered certainly no 
geniuses. Talking of walls, what can have induced so many 
persons to build lean-to houses ? Is it that the first greenhouse 
was a glass shed erected over a tree—a Vine, perhaps—already 
growing on a wall, and that we all, sheep-like, must follow in 
the same track ? Can any one point out the advantage of the 
style of building? If the front is high enough to stand with 
your hat on, and the house of any width, you must require a 
ladder to train a Yine or gather Grapes. If it is devoted to 
plants, you must often turn them round or they will grow to one 
side. If Peaches are trained to the wall, you can have no breeze 
playing amongst their flowers, so conducive to their setting 
i freely, and you have the sun shining only on one side of the 
j fruit, causing it to be overripe on one side whilst green on the 
other—one of the greatest causes of deficiency of flavour. We 
trust the days of the ugly lean-to house with its plant-stages and 
other inconveniences, are numbered, as well as those of Peach 
walls. I will now give the result of our experience in the 
management of an orchard-house, and if others will do the same 
it may be beneficial to all interested in the subject. 
We will suppose the frmt all gathered. We top dress or pot 
the plants at once in good turfy loam rather dry, and make it 
pretty solid, but not so much so as the first season, as we found 
when too solid and kept dry all the winter there was a difficulty 
in watering them properly the following year, the ball shrinking 
from the pot sides, and the water escaping by the space left; 
for the same reason we do not let the soil get so dry as formerly, 
watering them several times during winter. When they have 
lost all their leaves the plants are painted over with a mixture of 
Gishurst Compound, six ounces to a gallon of tobacco water, to 
which is added a little clay, cow-manure, lime, and soot, then put 
together, and some leaves thrown over their pots. 
The house is left open every day when there is no frost to 
keep back the bloom. When they begin to show signs of start¬ 
ing in the spring the house is cleared of litter, the plants pruned 
and put in their places. The house is now kept open whenever 
there is no frost; if there is a cold wind one side only is opened, 
but we shut every night for fear of frost. 
When the bloom is fairly out we give air whenever it is not 
too cold or windy ; if too cold to open the house, or there are no 
bees about, we dust the blooms with a camel-hair brush to make 
sure of their setting, performing this operation in the middle of 
a sunny day, and shutting the house early to retain a little 
warmth during the night. 
At this period the house is kept as dry as possible, unless a 
frost so severe as to endanger the bloom occurs, which has only 
happened once during the last three years. We then syringed with 
cold water the first thing in the morning, and suffered no loss 
in Peaches or Nectarines, though the Apricots, which were as 
large as Peas, required less thinning than usual. Whilst in 
bloom great care should be taken to guard against the smother 
fly, as, if these arc numerous, all hopes of fruit setting are gone, 
and daily attention is necessary to guard against these enemies 
whilst the plants are in bloom. As it is better not to syringe 
when the plants are blooming, a boy looks over the house every 
day, and if he sees any fly, touches them with a painter’s brush 
dipped in a solution of two ounces of Gishurst Compound in a 
gallon of tobacco water. Never was the adage of “ a stitch in 
time saves nine” more applicable than in this case. During the 
growing season the plants may be stopped as often as necessary 
to form them into pretty bushes. After the fruit is set we 
syringe every day, in very hot weather, morning and evening, and 
shut up the house early till the fruit is ripe, finding it earlier and 
better ripened than when we ventilated more. The fruit is 
thinned out twice, and.only from one dozen to fifteen left on a 
small tree (twenty-five are enough for any tree in a pot) : it takes 
some time to be convinced of the bad policy of leaving too many 
fruits on a plant. 
Once a-week, after the fruit is big as Walnuts, our plants get 
a good dose of manure water—not thin manure tea, but horse, 
cow, and sheep-manure mixed almost as thickly as will pour out 
of a pan with the rose off. We do not allow the trees to root 
through the pots into the bed below them, but feed them in the 
pots; roots growing through soon stop the drainage holes. 
With this treatment nothing can be more satisfactory than our 
orchard-house, and no single person of the many I have invited 
to taste the Beaches, Nectarines, or Apricots has said they were 
no better than wall-fruit; whilst most declare they never tasted 
such fruit before, that from the walls bearing no comparison in 
point of flavour. 
We have discarded Pears, as they were generally worthless ; 
and Plums, because we did not think them good enough, nor 
improved in flavour. When we consider the number of houses 
built to grow Grapes, and the coal consumed in the process, we 
may be sure now that fruit, which many value more highly, can 
be grown without fire heat. The days of orchard-houses are 
but just beginning: one builder in this neighbourhood is making 
quite a trade of erecting them.—T. R. Peabsou, Chilwell. 
METHOD OF PBUNING THE PEACH THEE. 
The following is translated from a work entitled “Elementary 
Instruction on the Management of Eruit Trees,” by M. A. Du 
Breuil, member of several French Societies, published at Paris 
in the present year :— 
“For several years past general attention has been directed to 
a mode of pruning of which we have refrained speaking till a 
sufficiently extended trial had proved its advantages. This new 
mode was first adopted about 1847 by M. Picot-Amet de 
Aincourt, near Magny (Seine and Oise), and shortly afterwards 
by M. Grin the elder, of Bourgneuf Cliartries, but with a remark¬ 
able improvement. We have seen in October 1856, at M. Grin’s 
establishment, such excellent results of this method, after being 
applied during five years on the same trees, that we have no 
hesitation in recommending it to the exclusion of every other.” 
The following is a description of the practical carrying out of 
this process :— 
“ When the side shoots from the main branches attain a length 
of about two inches and a half the back buds are removed; 
then only one bud is left at each point where double or triple 
ones occur, those in front being retained. At the same time these 
shoots are submitted to a very rigorous pinching— i.e., they are 
stopped with the thumb and finger above the two well-developed 
leaves nearest the base. The little leaflets imperfectly developed 
at the base are not reckoned, these often form a rosette at the 
lower part of the shoot. 
“ Soon afterwards a fresh shoot ( bourgeon anticipe) is seen 
to spring from the axil of each of these leaves. These last 
are likewise pinched as soon as they have attained a length of 
about one inch and a half, but this pinching takes place above 
the first leaf. Fresh shoots again appear at the axils of the 
leaves of the first. But the season is already advanced, and 
the sap acts with less intensity, so that their development is 
feeble; they often only attain a length of a small part of an inch. 
Those of the extremity only attain a little further extension. 
Both are pinched above the first leaf as soon as they are one inch 
and a half in length. If fresh shoots appear after the third 
pinching, they are removed altogether. 
“ After the fall of the leaves and at the time of the winter 
pruning, these different shoots result in the assemblage of spurs 
shown in th efigs. 1 and 2. 
“ The different pinchings which we have just described have 
the effect of weakening the side shoots, by concentrating all the 
action of the sap towards the leading shoot of the principal 
branch. Thus each of these shoots has given rise to spurs of 
weak growth, and covered with flower-buds. 
“ At the pruning of these spurs they are cut at the points A. 
