28 6 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, February 7, 1860. 
It a frost is expected I have a fire for a short time, and shut up 
the house whilst the temperature is warm. I generally shut up 
about three o’clock in winter, and at four put on the cover. In 
the very severe frost we had in December I had the fire made up 
again at five, p.m., and found the thermometer the next morning 
at 40°. 
At the present time I think if the house were shut up on sunny 
days an hour before the sun went off it, and the cover put on J 
immediately the sun left it, there would be sufficient natural heat I 
for ordinary greenhouse plants. I suffer from damp, therefore 
have a little fire most days. I use the white cloth, as, if frost is 
very severe, the cover need not be removed during the day, and 
there is light sufficient for the plants for a short period. I have ! 
not lost a plant yet; and have Verbenas, Cupheas, Ageratums, 
N ierembergias, Lobelias, and many other bedding things, besides 
Primulas, florists’ Geraniums, and variegated ditto, all looking 
healthy, and beginning to grow just now. My Calceolarias I keep 
in a cold house, and they do very well. 
hrom observation, I think gentlemen’s gardeners and amateurs 
do not shut their houses early enough.— Kate. 
SUBSTITUTE for the YELLOW CALCEOLAEIA. 
We observe, in a recent number of The Cottage Gardener, 
some remarks upon the failure of late years of the yellow Cal¬ 
ceolaria as a bedding plant, and the difficulty of obtaining an 
efficient substitute. The direction for relief appears to be in the 
way of the Tropseolums, and we venture to observe that the new 
yellow Tom Thumb Nasturtium,—seed of which we have the 
pleasure of offering this year for the first time, will be found not 
only a bedding plant of equal merit with the yellow Calceolaria, 
but, from its masses of blossoms, much superior to that old 
favourite. Some entire plants of it were exhibited to the Floral 
Committee of the Horticultural Society last year, and were recom¬ 
mended by them as likely to be of great use as a bedding plant. A 
correspondent in your issue of January 24th states that the dwarf 
French Marigold wrnuld answer well as a substitute for the 
yellow Calceolaria, but that no seed could be obtained that could 
be depended upon ; we should feel obliged if your correspondent 
would favour us with a trial, the results of which we feel con¬ 
fident would considerably modify the opinion at present enter¬ 
tained.— James Carter & Co. 
[Judging from the plate we have received, this Nasturtium is 
of a very dwarf, compact habit of growth, and produces a pro¬ 
fusion of large, rich, golden-yellow flowers.— Eds. C. G.J 
HEATING A COMBINATION OF HOUSES. 
I was much benefited by your advice at page 611, but there 
are some points I have neglected to ask you upon, and with 
which I am not at one with our builder and architect. You speak 
of a layer of clinkers over the pipes. Now, I presume we must 
have some sort of a bottom above the clinkers to retain the 
earth from the heat, which I fear will scorch the roots. The 
height of the wall and the breadth of the border will give a roof 
of about 19 feet in length. What depth will the astragals 
require to be at 13 inches or 14 inches apart, to carry glass of 
21ozs. or 16 ozs. per square foot? We propose to leave 13 
inches or 14 inches at the top unglazed, and to substitute a 
hinged board of wood to overlap the glass a little, and to lift up 
jot ventilation, but too small a space, I doubt. Then the house 
being divided by a middle wall, as you propose, we still have 
LS inches nearly all the length of the front of the upright glass 
for the Melons ventilation. The boiler has already three 11-inch 
pipes fixed on the top for flow-pipes, and three for the return of , 
the water. We intend to join a double 4-inch pipe to this and 
carry one arm of each just above the surface of the soil, and all j 
round the edge of the Melon-bed, and return them below the 
middle ot the bed. The other 11-itieh pipes being required for 
the other houses, iuy employer wishes me to put Peaches on the 
mid end division, which I think of no use. 
Would you be kind enough to inform me what sorts of Plums 
and Peaches are best suited for growing in pots ?_ Pumpkin. 
[ You propose, as formerly stated, heating your Melon-house 
from the orchard-house. For reasons given we would have pre¬ 
ferred the reverse the power to heat the Melon-house without 
heating the orchard-house at all j but that you may be doing. 
We are no admirers of lf-inch pipes for hot water. We willingly 
would never have them less than three. The division longitu¬ 
dinally between the orchard-house and Melon-house may be brick 
aud glass, wood, or wood and glass. We presume you mean to 
have a pathway in the Melon-house sunk at the back, and a 
door at one end, so that you can step down ; or if the roof is to 
be fixed, and in one sweep from back to front, over orchard- 
house and Melon-house, we do not see well how you are to get at 
them, unless you had large openings in the dividing-wall, and 
attend to them from the orchard-house. The openings for air 
at the back or dividing-wall will scarcely do for the Melons. 
Amu should also have some small openings in the front wall. 
Besides, the ventilation from the Melons will heat considerably 
the orchard-house behind; and besides the board at top, we 
should like to have three or four spaces between the sash-bars 
to open in front. This longitudinal division will give a bracing 
to the astragals, or bars for the glass ; and, therefore, if these are 
of good deal, and 3^ inches by If inch, we presume they will 
be strong enough. Without this dividing-wall as in the other 
house, we would have an iron rod longitudinally in the middle, 
from end to end, aud an iron support in the centre. Without that 
we should consider that bars or rafters of 4 inches by 2f inches 
would be necessary for that length and weight of glass. The 
mode of heating the Melon-house will answer. The matter of 
the brickbats is easily settled—say that you have got a depth of 
a foot above the pipes, place brickbats as hollow as you can all 
round them, covering six inches deep ; then place three inches of 
small pieces of rough gravel, &c., two inches of finer gravel, and 
one inch of very fine, or the latter may be rough sand and lime 
put on when hot, and fresh mixed, and made smooth on the 
surface. Neither roots nor moisture will easily go through this; 
so that, if your bed is surrounded with a wall, a few holes 
should be left to enable you to judge whether moisture is station¬ 
ary there or not. Not long ago the whole modus operandi was 
described. We are not sufficiently acquainted with your locality 
to say whether you can get plants suitable near you or not; and 
we make it a rule never to recommend tradesmen, because we 
always get honourably dealt with by all such as advertise in our 
columns, and from these advertisements and recent articles you 
can be at no loss to know where such articles are to be found. 
The price generally depending upon size and quality. 
We do not know a Peach but may be grown in a pot, and every 
dessert Plum may also be so fruited. If you have done little in 
that way we recommend you to consult Mr. Rivers’s little book 
“ The Orchard House.” Nurserymen, as a rule, on a clear expo¬ 
sition of wants and wishes, will do better for a gardener under 
such circumstances than we could do, by making out a list for 
him.] 
PEESEEVING WOOD. 
Quite recently, while walking iu the garden with the Hon. 
J. \\. Fairfield, Hudson, N. Y., lie called my attention to the 
small stakes which supported the Raspberry-canes. The end 
in the ground, as well as the part above, was as sound and 
bright as if lately made, but he informed me that they had 
been iu constant use for twelve years! Said I, “ Of course 
they are cyanized?” “ Yes,” he replied, “and the process is so 
simple and cheap that it deserves to be universally known, and 
it is simply this:—One pound of blue vitriol to twenty quarts 
of water. Dissolve the vitriol with boiling -water, and then add 
the remainder.” 
“ The end of the stick is then dropped into the solution, and 
left to stand four or five days; for shingle, three days will 
answer; and for post six inches square, ten days. Care is to 
be taken that the saturation takes place in a metal vessel or 
keyed box, for the reason that any barrel will be shrunk by the 
operation so as to leak. Instead of expanding an old cask, as 
other liquids do, this shrinks them. Chloride of zinc, I am 
told, will answer the same purpose; but the blue vitriol is, or 
was formerly, very cheap, viz., three to six cents per pound.” 
Mr. Fail-field informed me that the French Government are 
pursuing a similar process with every item of timber now used 
in ship building, and that they have a way of forcing it into 
the trees in the forest as soon as cut, ejecting the sap, and 
cyanising it all on the spot. I have not experimented with it, 
but Mr. Fairfield’s success seemed to be complete. 
The process is so simple and cheap as to be within the con¬ 
venience of every farmer, and gardener even, and I therefore 
thought it so valuable as to warrant a special notice of it._ 
Prairie Farmer.) 
