non THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION, September 22, 1857. 
by which all such things can be .judged, which are as 
true as those by which the world and the rest of the 
planets move in space ; and to discuss them, even in my 
small capacity, will assuredly help to infuse a more 
correct taste for flower gardening than all that I could 
write about bedding plants in a twelvemonth. 
Kew is open to all free of expense. An hour there in 
an afternoon with this number of The Cottage 
Gardener will do you more good, even though the 
writer may be altogether wrong in his judgment, than 
two or three hours’ sauntering about the garden and 
picking up the names of Verbenas and other bedding 
plants. The plants in every bed at Kew and at 
Hampton Court are properly named—a grand advantage. 
I recollect the time when the gardeners who worked 
there among the plants ivere not alloived to pick up the 
name of a single plant there. “It was the narrow¬ 
minded doctrine of Sir Joseph Banks” (Herbert) 
against the liberal-minded Sir Benjamin Hall and Sir 
William Hooker. “ The evil consequences which flowed 
from the had system pursued there, tending to loosen 
the ties of morality, and to create a feeling of satis¬ 
faction when it was known that cuttings had been 
stolen from the large plants hoarded there” (Herbert), 
are and have been long since remedied, and “ the 
feeling of satisfaction” now is the readiness with which 
every improvement in gardening for the million is 
seized on by the authorities there, and is conducted by 
th*e heads of departments with as much zeal as if they 
were doing it “ for their own selves.” 
Another grand new feature at Kew this season is a 
repetition of the promenade style of placing flower-beds 
along the leading walk from the north entrance of the 
Palm conservatory to the extremity of the American 
garden, and from hence to the gate of the pleasure 
ground, in a straight line—another system of pincushion 
beds. The plants in all these beds I have in black and 
white, and will “give them” shortly; meantime I shall 
conclude with a characteristic anecdote. 
On going along the pincushion beds towards the 
pleasure grounds I asked Mr. Craig how he could have 
thus taken a leaf out of the Experimental Garden. 
“ I never thought of it,” said lie; “ but, wishing these 
climbing Roses to grow as fast as possible, I made larger 
circles for them than pleased us; but Sir William 
Hooker was so anxious to get up the climbers as soon 
as possible that I was obliged to have larger circles for 
them than might otherwise be desirable, and to take off 
the raw appearance ‘ we settled ’ to plant them with 
bedding plants, in continuation of the new beds through 
the American ground.” And most beautiful these pin¬ 
cushion beds looked half a mile off—in scarlet and yellow 
chiefly. “ Necessity is the mother of invention,” ac¬ 
cording to the adage, but is far from the point. I know 
fifty cases of urgent necessity, and not the slightest 
idea of inventing a broom handle to sweep them out; 
but let necessity force itself on man’s understanding or 
on woman’s vocal prerogative, and depend upon it he or 
she will not be long in discovering the true invention. 
The necessity of a rapid growth presented itself to the 
practical heads of Sir Joseph Paxton in the case of 
the Deodars, and to Mr. Craig in that of Felicites, 
Bugas, and Multifloras; and thus they robbed me of 
the credit of the invention of pincushion beds for the 
grand improvement and ultimatum settling of standard 
Rose culture in the British isles. D. Beaton. 
Gooseberry Caterpillars.—I think I ought to inform 
you and your numerous readers that I again completely 
succeeded this year in keeping off these pests by my usual 
method of strewing soot plentifully into the soil under the 
trees in the spring. I had a most plentiful crop of fruit.— 
T. M. W. 
GATHERINGS FROM NEIGHBOURS. 
WREST PARK. 
This splendid place, about seven miles from the 
Hitchin station on the Great Northern, has been several 
times noticed in these pages, and to those notices I would 
refer for some faint idea of the position and beauty of 
the mansion, garden, pleasure grounds, and park. My 
gatherings at present will be confined to a few little 
additional matters that have left their traces on my 
memory from a recent visit. Writing this on the 7th 
of September, I am well aware that the best judges in 
the gardening world will have decided upon some of my 
reminiscences before they are honoured with printers’ 
ink. Whatever opinions, therefore, may here be advanced 
will be thoroughly unbiased by the views or decisions 
of others. 
As previously stated, whoever visits Wrest should 
either enter or return by the beautiful entrance at Silsoe, 
in. order to see the pointed Gothic arch, cathedral-like 
style in which the boughs and branches of the avenue 
of Elms meet and cross each other. I have been 
assured that no art has been used for securing this 
striking effect, though no doubt the width across from one 
Elm tree to another, and the somewhat small space 
between each row of Elms and another row of Spanish 
Chestnuts behind them, have contributed so far in 
causing the Elms to throw their boughs across the 
carriage way. I will now confine myself to the garden. 
On entering at Mr. Snow’s house I noticed a fine plant 
of the double scarlet or crimson Pomegranate blooming 
freely on the wall, and festooning the doorway. The 
climate of Wrest may thus far be judged. Notwithstand¬ 
ing this, however, a fine, much-prized plant of Ceanothus 
azureus had ceased to exist, though only a few yards 
distant. Whether either from some lingering hope that 
the plant was not quite gone, or the warmth of that 
affection that clings even to the faded remnants of 
what was once so prized and lovely, or from a more 
utilitarian resolve that, having ceased to be beautiful, 
it should nevertheless be forced to support and brace 
something else that was so, I really do not know, but 
certain it is that only here and there could you see 
pieces of the skeleton branches, so thoroughly were 
they twined and twisted over by the Ipomaa ccerulea 
rubra, just beginning to show its bloom buds. At the 
base of the wall where the Ipomaea had left an open 
space, and at the foot of the conservative wall in other 
places, were pretty blooming plants, from two and a 
half to nearly four feet in height, and wide in proportion, 
of the hardy annual Hibiscus Africanus; and I am not 
sure but there were also some of the Hibiscus trionum, 
better known in seed-lists as Bladder Ketniia. Few things 
could be more beautiful than the fine yellowish blossoms, 
with their striking dark centres expanded to the sun¬ 
beam. And how were such nice plants of an annual now 
seldom met with coaxed into such vigour and fertility ? 
Seeds from early flowers are allowed to drop and vegetate. 
Some seedlings of these two or three inches in height 
are taken up and potted in October, kept from frost all 
the winter, and turned out at the foot of the wall in 
April and May. This is worth noting even by our 
window gardeners. How beautiful such plants would 
look on a warm balcony ! Many common things pass 
unobserved and neglected, because we have never made 
the most of them, or knew not how to do it. Here and 
in other borders were growing nice patches of the 
Datura ceratocaulon just where they had been sown, very 
striking from their large, whitish, fragrant flowers, pro¬ 
duced in continuous abundance. 
Peach Trees wearing out. —As a consolation in 
some measure to those who fret themselves about the 
short time their trees remain in health and fertility, I 
noticed that but few of the first trees planted by Mr. 
