THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, March 20, 1860. 
387 
Pyramidal Fruit Trees (A Greenhorn). —We are not in a position to 
decide as to the expense of your trees. By your own account, your trees 
were trained so far as to have a central stem, and a good supply of healthy 
side-branches, from the base upwards. People have different ideas of 
what a pyramidal tree is, and we think, with the skeleton sent you, it would 
be possible to make your trees of any desired shape, either as a pointed, 
or a somewhat more obtuse upright shape. Considering the change, we 
think your slants have done well, and most likely either this season or the 
next, you will have bloom-buds on the wood the nurseryman sent you. If 
you shorten at all this season, an inch of the points will be enough. Next 
season you will have more growth and may shape accordingly. • If we 
stopped the tree against the wall at all. it would merely be to shorten the 
points of the shoots by an inch or so. Next year you will have more wood. 
Keep the central shoot well down, so as to get wood to fill the tree. All 
seems as it should be. Buy Mr. Rivers’ “Miniature Fruit Garden.” 
Botanical Terms ( A Constant Reader). —Lindley’s “ Elements of 
Botany ” will furnish you with the signification and illustrations of all the 
technical terms. 
Cyclamens (II. P. Du prey). —Your plant is a common form of the new 
strain of Cyclamen ccum— the only difference from the original coum 
being in the upper surface and form of the leaf. We have a patch of the 
same plant out in a cold frame but kept from frost, with leaves twice 
the size, and in oue mass of bloom; but many thanks for your offer not¬ 
withstanding. 
Grass and Clover Seeds (A Young Farmer). —You will find the in¬ 
formation as to quantities at page 582, article “Grass” of Johnson’s 
“Farmers’ Encyclopedia;” but we recommend you to buy P. Lawson and 
Son’s excellent “ Treatise on the Cultivated Grasses.” It may be had 
from their office in Great George Street, Westminster. 
Indian-Rubber Plant (A Window Gardener).— Your plant is the 
Ficus clastica. In general the temperature should seldom be lower than 
45° ; when growing it likes 10° or 15° more. We might have helped you 
better had we known the means at your command as a window gardener, 
and the length of the shoots you wish to propagate. If the shoots are not 
more than three or four inches long, you might manage them in your 
window in April. If you have such a thing as a hotbed, prepare for 
striking the shoots you can spare now. The first thing to do, is to let the 
plant get rather dry for a week, preferring to sponge the leaves, instead of 
giving much moisture at the roots. This will concentrate the juices, and 
prevent the shoots bleeding so much when cut. Then slip off the shoots, 
if not extra long, close to the older stem, daub a little pounded chalk and 
charcoal on the wound made, do the same on the end of your cutting, and 
where you may require to remove a leaf at its base, lay the end of the 
cutting exposed in a dryish place for twenty-four hours ; but place damp 
paper or moss on the upper end of the cutting. Then rub off the most of 
the chalk, without causing fresh bleeding, and insert in a pot of sandy soil, 
and place under a glass in a hotbed, such as a Cucumber-frame. When 
struck, grow in loam, peat, and lime rubbish. We have seen them struck 
in a window in May, with a cone of thin, glazed paper put over them in 
the way of a glass. If the shoots are not above three inches long, and the 
pot is placed near the front of Cucumber-box, they would need no bell- 
glass over them. 
Grubs attacking Greenhouse Roots (R. C.).- —Your Begonia tubers 
and softwooded greenhouse plants are attacked by the larvae of the very 
troublesome Weevil, Otiorhynchus vastator, which was figured in one of 
the early volumes of The Cottage Gardener. The plants should be 
carefully inspected, and the earth removed from the roots of such as show 
signs of the presence of the larvae, which are easily seen from their white 
colour. The beetles themselves appear later in the year ; and being of a 
dirty brown colour are more difficult to find, as they hide in the earth by 
day, and only come out to feed by night. They may, ho wever, then be 
easily caught by coming into the greenhouse suddenly with a light, and 
shaking the plants over a sheet.—W. 
Names op Plants (A. R. C.).— The bits sent appear to be of the follow¬ 
ing :—1, Coronilla glauca ; 2, Genista Canariensis; 3, Cytisusracemosus ; 
4, Mitraria coccinea ; 5, Hcrmannia alnifolia. It is quite impossible for 
us to tell what causes the white spots on all the blossoms of your rose- 
coloured Camellias without seeing the petals, and knowing how the plants 
are treated. 
POULTRY AND BEE-KEEPER’S CHRONICLE. 
POULTRY SHOWS. 
May 23d and 21th. Beverley and East Riding op Yorkshire. Sec., 
Mr. Fras. Calvert, Surgeon, &c. Entries close May 17th. 
July 18th and 19th. Merthyr Tydvil. Sec., Mr. W. It. Harris, 142. 
High Street, Merthyr. 
N.B .—Secretaries will oblige us by sending early copies of their lists. 
KEEPING POULTRY PROFITABLY. 
There are other ways of making profit of poultry besides 
selling at a Show. There arc those who cannot attend Shows, 
and who trust to the catalogue for information and assistance. 
They see the list of pens belonging to the successful exhibitor, 
and apply for birds of the same strain; while others, more 
modest, ask the price of a sitting of eggs. Where care has been 
taken to weed a yard at the proper time, where exhibition is 
followed up with prize-taking as a constant result, and sales have 
been the consequence, it will be found that sales are perforce 
declined, that the breeding-stock may not be encroached upon, 
and this is a profitable proceeding. Wherever emolument, or 
even self-support, are to result from poultry keeping, stock 
must always be rather below than above the average. Mouths 
should be counted, as they are in a city about to suffer siege, and 
all that cannot earn their food must go. Those three pullets that 
won in the chicken class 1859, mugt do the same as adults in 
1860. Mrs. Thrifty shakes her head, and says, “ It is a long 
time to keep them.” Mr. T. smiles, and says, “ All the eggs they 
will lay are sold at a good price, and will pay for their food over 
and over again.” 
We said we should fall into conversation, and we shall. 
Talleyrand said, when going up to take the oath of allegiance to 
Louis Philippe, “ It is the twenty-first, I pray it may be the 
last.” We fancy certain pens, Miss Rake’s Spanish, Mr. 
Worrall’s Hamburghs, Captain Hornby’s and Mr. Wakefield’s 
Dorkings, Mr. Archer’s Silvers, Mr. Tomlinson’s Cochins, Mr. 
Moss’s Game, Mr. Fowler’s Ducks and Geese, Mrs. Pettat’s 
Polands, and others must shudder at the sight of the basket in 
which they have travelled so often—must know certain Judges 
by sight; and, while they sigh over the confinement, smile on 
recognising familiar faces. That wdiich had become wearisome 
and a farce to Talleyrand, is an imposing ceremony to our rifle¬ 
man of 1860; and the pens we have mentioned must be hardened 
to success. In the hands of any one disposed to make money of 
them, such pens as these may realise the fable of the golden eggs. 
There is something gratifying to an owner to see prize pullets 
growing into prize hens, and earning money all the time. The 
profit of one of them may be small, but multiplied by a hundred 
it becomes important. The second result of successful exhibition 
will be the sale of all the surplus stock at more than remune¬ 
rating prices, and the sale of all the eggs at Is. each for sitting, 
instead of 6s. per hundred for puddings. Admit that we have 
over-stated the numbers, and we will still prove a profit. A hen 
will cost 2 d. per week to keep in high condition—8s. 8 d. per year, 
and at least you will sell fifteen eggs at Is. Profit, 6s. 4 d. As for 
those who make 3s. each, why it beats the “ Diggings.” We say 
nothing about prizes or stock birds, or surplus eggs eaten or 
sold ; but we put fee profit of thirty good hens or pullets of a 
known successful strain at £9 per year, being the second way of 
keeping poultry profitably. 
COLOUR OF SPANISH FOWLS’ EGOS. 
Having paid 30s. for a handsome Spanish hen, and finding 
she lays a tinted-coloured egg (of which I enclose a sample), I 
shall feel obliged by your opinion, whether this is possible to 
occur, if she be of a decidedly pure breed.— A Subscriber. 
[We keep very many Spanish fowls, and although they are 
rare, we have sometimes eggs of the colour of the shell you have 
enclosed. It would certainly not enhance the value of the bird 
in our eyes, yet we should be loth to discard or to judge her 
harshly on account of it. It is very common for Dorkings to 
lay such, and all who have watched Cochin-Chinas must be 
aware of the remarkable difference in shade and colour there is 
in eggs laid by the same hen. Having said this, we would add, 
we should not hatch these eggs if we had any others.] 
MANGOLD WURTZEL FOR FOWLS—VICIOUS 
GANDER. 
Seeing some fowls pecking at a Mangold Wurtzel in a 
farmer’s yard, I have bought some for my fowls. It seems to me 
an excellent green meat for them at this dead season. I throw 
one down in the yard, and they seem to eDjoy the fun of pull¬ 
ing out bit by bit. It costs Gd. the bushel of fifty-four pounds. 
I give it them raw. 
I have a vicious gander which has a fancy for killing other 
birds. He set on a white duck the other day, and did his best 
to kill her. Now he has taken a spite against a fine Dorking 
cock, and seems to intend to kill him. Can I do anything to 
cure him ? He is a fine powerful fellow. C. R. 
[Does the gander show his bullying propensities at any other 
time than the incubating season ?— Eds. C. G.] 
EVERLASTING LAYERS. 
I entirely endorse your opinion as to the breed of the 
fowls to which “ J. C. H." refers. I had three Silver Ham¬ 
burgh hens which began to assume the iron-grey appearance 
you name at the age of three years, and each year became 
