200 THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION, June 80, 1857. 
will be “run” after as the Golden Chain was for an 
edging to the Nosegay beds, being a true pink flower 
like lateripes roseum. 
The gentleman who saved the true Diadematum Gera- 
i ilium from being lost sent it to me in the spring. It is 
also in the Wellington Road Nursery, and 1 see the 
Messrs. Henderson have it in their last catalogue, 
saddled on your humble servant for the authority of the 
kind. 1 never object to having the saddle on the right 
horse for good riders, nor grudge a new pot for an old 
! bedder like this. D. Beaton. 
GROWING MUSHROOMS “LARGE, THICK, 
AND FAT.” 
“ Can you put me in the way of improving my growth of 
Mushrooms ? I have built a house for the purpose, with 
stove, &c., and believe my gardener uses good spawn, and 
pursues an approved course of cultivation, watering them 
and giving other care; but they do not grow as I like to see 
them. I like them to be large , thick, and fat, but not 
spreading like an umbrella; in fact, Avhen cut to he like half 
an orange or an apple—compact and fleshy, not thin; and 
when broiled not like a piece of brown paper. In Covent 
: Garden I see wliat I do like.”—L. J. 
There is no accounting for diversities in taste. Even 
| in a small establishment it is next to impossible for 
the ablest gardener to please every one. This could 
only be done by each person having a separate dish of 
some fancied article, and then satisfaction would only 
i be realised when the artiste of a cook could be persuaded 
to prepare each dish in a certain manner. We meet 
with people who very sensibly prefer nice green As¬ 
paragus, the greater part of which is sweet, tender, and 
eatable. We meet with others who as much as tell us 
that such green stuff is no Asparagus at all. Nothing will 
satisfy them but the Asparagus with the inch of eatable 
top, all the rest being beautifully white as ivory, and as 
hard as a kettle-drum stick. I knew a gentleman who 
looked upon the yellow Maltese Turnip as the queen of 
esculents; but, though he fumed and fretted, and almost 
stormed, his tasting his favourite dish was like the 
visits of angels, few and far between—the controller 
of the kitchen department would cook none but white 
j ones. Who does not know that complaints about this 
and that kind of Potato frequently regale the gar- 
j dener’s ears, just because those who sod instead of boil 
them are too great-minded to take a hint from a 
cottager’s home or an Irishman’s cabin? So with the 
Mushroom : much of its quality when served up depends 
upon the cooking. Unlike our correspondent some prefer 
even buttons not too thick, and the Mushroom when 
full grown to be rather flat-headed, because it is easier to 
cook it thoroughly. Some, again, prefer them thick and 
fleshy ; but then, again, they get tired of the thick and 
fleshy ones, because the artiste either will not or cannot 
cook them thoroughly. The outside is beautiful they 
j say, but the inside is raw and hard. It matters not 
though you find no bone in them if you try them 
1 yourself by stewing or frizzling. Common prudence 
j demands that, if possible, the gardener should supply 
the kind of article not that this or that visitor may 
I chiefly prize, but what the head of the establishment 
who pays him for his labours most desires. Owing 
! these various tastes I have had to try and get Mush¬ 
rooms in all gradations, from very thin to very thick 
and solid. If my experience will be at all useful to our 
I correspondent and others it is freely at their service. 
I was once acquainted with a Mushroom house that for 
j years had hardly swelled a Mushroom, and yet the place 
was rather celebrated for Mushrooms; for, though they 
| could not be got in the Mushroom house, they frequently 
j came so nice of their own accord in the inside borders 
of the houses as to take the prize at Horticultural Ex¬ 
hibitions. . j 
A t one time I had the management of beds in an Old 
acre house, heated by a flue, so far as the preparing of 
the beds was concerned. Horse droppings were chiefly j 
used, and these were chopped and turned so often, and 
so mixed with dry soil, that the nutritious qualities were 
well nigh all driven out of it. We had Mushrooms it 
is true, but generally thin enough, and in quantity so 
meagre as would now be deemed a failure. The dryness 
of the beds, the drying effects of the flue, without 
steaming and lashing water about, and the heat of the 
place frequently ranging from 65° to 70°, were the ; 
causes tif failure. Extra heat will draw out any Mush¬ 
rooms thin. From 55° to 00° is what I prefer, though 
I have had fine Mushrooms at from 45° to 50°. 
When I first began to grow Mushrooms entirely on 
my own account I thought over what 1 had previously 
seen and done, and, as I found that Mushrooms would 
be extra desirable in winter, though there was no Mush¬ 
room house I resolved on trying several modes, for there 
was no want of manure; and as all of them were suc¬ 
cessful, though some more than others, if I draw upon 
my recollection it is not from any feeling of egotism, but 
that others similarly situated may get a hint to suit them. 
1. Finding, in the month of August, in dung linings 
that wanted renewing, a good quantity of shortish flaky 
manure from the stable that had heated itself dry, I 
had this wheeled to an open spot, shaken and broken 
well with the fork, and then built firmly in a ridge a 
yard wide at bottom, and a yard high to the apex : I 
forget now how many yards in length, but that does not 
signify. Contrary to my expectation, this dryish wasted 
material heated rather violently. An old practitioner 
that I called in to see it advised boring it full of holes 
to let the heat out; but, as I considered that the mate¬ 
rial was rather of an open nature, and boring holes 
would make it opener still, and thus at first rather in¬ 
crease the heat, I preferred beating the bed hard all 
over, and sprinkling a little soil over it to keep the air 
out, instead of letting it in, and in a short time the bed 
gradually decreased in temperature; and when it was 
about 90°, or the heat of new milk, I inserted pieces of 
good spawn about the size of walnuts every nine inches j 
equally all over it, placing these bits of spawn about one | 
inch and a half below the surface, and beating that j 
surface well again. The mere hole-making to admit the ! 
spawn increased the heat a little, but not prejudicially, 
and in a few days it was quite fit for earthing up, the 
thermometer that was on the bed standing at 88°. The 
garden soil being well stored with manurial matter, and 
as a necessary consequence not deficient in worms and 
slugs, the former of which would have prevented the 
soil of the bed being firm enough, and the latter would 
have feasted on the Mushrooms instead of my em¬ 
ployers, I dug down between two and three feet, and 
got some stiffish fresh soil from the bottom of the 
trench, with which I cased the bed about two inches 
and a half thick, kneading it in as compactly as 
possible, watering it over, and when a little dryish 
making it both smooth and hard with a clean spade, 
and then threw over it a little loose litter to prevent 
the sun and air cracking it. As the nights got colder a ( 
little more litter was used, and ultimately drawn straw 
to throw off the wet. During autumn, winter, and I 
spring the inside of the bed varied from 85° down to I 
60°, and the surface ranged from 65° to 48°. In seven j 
weeks from the insertion of the spawn the Mushrooms 
made their appearance, and continued producing for the 
best part of a twelvemonth. They were good in kind, 
but not particular as to thickness. 
2. At the same time I put up another bed made of j 
dung that had been worked sweet for a hotbed, but was 
rather moist, mixed with more exhausted, rather wet 
