THE COTTAGE GABDENEB AND COUNTBY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION, "March 10, 1857. 401 
to prune these side-shoots. Are they to he left as they are, 
or to be shortened ? and what is the rule ? Also, the next 
year gives another side-shoot. Is the year-before’s wood to 
he cut away, or how much of it, to make room for new 
wood? or what rule is generally the best? Give three 
illustrations:—1st year, straight shoots; 2nd year, side ditto; 
3rd ditto. 
“ Make some observations in your paper for gardeners to 
advertise, say some new Pines (trees) they may have plenty 
of, and the price. The same remark is good to any particular 
shrub people are looking after. Take a shrub, say Garrya 
elUptica, or even the common Laurestinm —how difficult it is 
to get large specimens ! ’’—T. A. Loxley. 
[B. Emngton is sorry and surprised that this gentleman 
cannot discover the secrets of Peach pruning, so much 
having been said. The fact is there is no occasion for much 
fuss about it. Trees have been repeatedly seen bearing better 
crops, badly pruned, than those which had received the most 
scientific knifing. This, however, does not prove that pruning 
is quite immaterial, but that it is not the “ key-stone ” of the 
arch. Young Peach trees, as soon as they have grown one 
year from the bud, are termed “ maidens.” They have one 
straight shoot, with generally a few side-spray. Below this 
latter are generally four or five dominant side-buds which 
have never sprouted, and the pruning knife is generally 
entered immediately above these. In the second year the 
tree sprouts from three to five shoots, according to its power, 
and these are pruned back in the rest season for a double 
reason—to remove ill-ripened portions, and to cause the tree 
to branch more, in order to cover the wall. Henceforth the 
thing gradually assumes the character of a fruit question 
rather than one about wood, and the business is, that whilst 
every regard is paid to the bearing wood, attention is also 
given to a proper succession of wood shoots. 
To say all that could be said in close detail would be to 
make a book; and, indeed, from its prolixity, would be 
doubtless somewhat tedious to a great portion of the more 
advanced readers of The Cottage Gardener. 
Mr. L. inquires thus : “What rule is generally the best?” 
There is no rule for cutting Peach trees except in the 
hand of a town “jobbing gardener.” We have to do with 
principles; after knowing these, a gardener of any sense 
cares little for rules—they seem a bother to him. Only sup¬ 
pose that a writer in The Cottage Gardener were to 
recommend a rule—say shorten every shoot one-fifth its 
length. This, although tolerable advice for Kent or Devon, 
would be infamous advice for the north of Yorkshire.] 
TBEATMENT OF A YOUNG PASSION - FLOWEB 
AND MAGNOLIA GBANDIFLOBA. 
“ Will you please inform me how to treat a Passijlora 
cccrulea which I had from a nursery last spring in a pot, and 
planted against my house, aspect south-east ? It made one 
shoot of about nine feet, and another of about six feet. 
As these, with the main stem of the plant, are very slender, 
I wish to know if I had better prune it back, and how far, 
with such directions for future treatment as your space will 
afford. Will it hurt a young Magnolia grandiflora to remove 
it at this season? and will the proposed aspect (south-east, 
exposed) suit it ?”—W. F. B., Redland. 
[All right, and no time lost. Your blue Passion-Flower 
made a famous start the first year, and this next summer 
it will grow three times as much, if not four times; but that 
will depend on your own earnestness to insure so much 
success. You say the nine-feet and six-feet growths are too 
slender. Too slender for what? But you are right, without 
finishing the sentence. AH the growths are yet too slender 
to form a sound bottom or body for a useful climber; and 
here is just where most people fail in getting good Glycines, 
good Passion-Flowers, and good Climbing Roses: they cut 
ever so far from the bottom unwittingly, thinking all the 
time that they are gaining so much time, whereas they are 
doing exactly the reverse ; they leave slender growths at such 
and such lengths, which hinder the plant from developing 
its native vigour. The six-feet growth ought to be reduced 
to the very last pair of eyes next to the nine-feet shoot, or 
say, out of six feet cut off five feet six inches, and if you 
flinch but one quarter of an inch we would not insure your 
success. The nine-feet shoot ought to be cut back to 
eighteen inches from where it began to grow last year. All 
should be done about the last week in April, but an old 
Passion-Flower might be cut a month sooner. Then, next 
summer, have the surface round the plant formed into a 
cup to hold water, and from the end of May to the end of 
August see that, whether it rains or shines, the plant does . 
not go more than four days without artificial watering with j 
a very weak liquid manure; and, during the whole season, j 
let nobody else touch, hurt, or cut one single leaf, or shoot, 
or tendril it makes the whole season, and as fast as they 
grow nail them upright, not sideways, this summer, as they 
will all be fearfully cut back again ; but we must hear the 
state of the plant again before we can say how low to cut 
them.] 
WINTEB AND SPBING GABDENING OUT OF 
DOOBS. 
“ I feel obliged by your kind notice of my query about 
‘ Winter and Spring Gardening out of doors,’ but I fear I 
did not make myself quite understood. I meant that on 
(say) the 1st of April all the evergreens should be removed 
from the flower beds, and gay bloomers, like Daisies, Pansies, 
Wallflowers, Stocks, &c., should succeed them during the 1 
whole of that month and May, until ‘bedding out’ com¬ 
mences in June in their stead. I never intended to mix 
bloomers with evergreens; it would not be in good taste.”— 
New Subscriber. 
[Your plan would do very well where a few beds only were 
to be so treated; but there are so very few things for the 
kind of bedding you want, that the plan cannot be much I 
adopted. We planted a large bed this week with Doronicum j 
Anstriacum, to bloom for six weeks from the latter end of 
March. The variegated Alyssum makes a nice bed late in 
April, and Cheiranthus Marshalli is another yellow bedder to 
succeed the Alyssum. Hyacinths and early and double Tulips 
come in after the middle of April. Aubrietia purpurea is 
a nice mass in April; and border Anemones, with Turban 
Ranunculus, double white Wood Anemone, and almost all 
the Californian annuals, sown in September, come in for 
May. None of these, however, or of any others, will do to 
be forwarded by any manner of nursing, or forcing, or 
keeping under glass, so as to come in earlier than is natural 
to them, as the cold east winds would nip them as soon as 
they were exposed.] 
SCABLET GEBANIUMS FOB A SMALL BED AND 
PILLAB. 
“ Oblige by telling me the best Scarlet Geranium for a 
circular bed of three feet radius ; also the best Scarlet 
Geranium for a pillar after the fashion of Bose pillars.”—A 
Beginner. 
[Tom Thumb is the best scarlet for your bed, and Shrub- 
land Scarlet, alias Smith’s Emperor, the best for pillai'S. 
They have them eighteen feet high out on the grass against 
poles at the late Bishop of London’s garden at Fulham. If 
you look at the indexes of former volumes for Geraniums 
you will see abundance of notes about all sorts of Geraniums ; 
but the above are the best two for you.] 
USING AN EXHAUSTED HOTBED. 
“ T. S. A. has a two-light box standing on an old Cucumber 
bed of last summer; he does not mean to have a hotbed this 
year, nor for the present to use the manure of his old bed. 
The soil on it is almost entirely leaf mould, and fine Cucum¬ 
bers he grew there last year (one of Crawshay’s Ne Plus 
Ultra, 27£ inches in length). What can he do with his 
lights upon the present bed? Early Potatoes? and if so, 
what description and name ? He has the stiff mould of his 
old Melon bed to mix with the leaf mould if requisite." 
[The Early Frame or the Ash-leaved Kidney will be the 
best. The leaf mould will be too rich by itself. Make it 
half-and-half of the Melon soil. Without more protection 
than the glass you will get the Potatoes a few weeks earlier. | 
If we had a few barrowsful of good fresh dung we would I 
