THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY 
can be renewed. Few implements are more really useful 
about a garden than a good broom, and it was with great 
satisfaction that we examined the invention of this worthy 
horticulturist, feeling more forcibly than before that he is 
the most practically useful man who neglects not the every¬ 
day duties of his profession .— James Rae, Edinhuryh. 
QUERIES AND ANSWERS. 
EASING THE SLIDING OF WINDOWS. 
“ Please say what is the best thing to put on hothouse 
< sliding windows to make them run easily. They stick with 
the damp. Our man put soft soap, but that has made it 
' worse.’’ —A. Zeba. 
i 
[There is nothing we have found better than soft soap, or 
even common soap, which, by the way, we like better. We 
| fear your sashes want easing with the plane. If the wood 
is at all new, or much moisture has been used in the house, 
they sometimes swell so much that nothing but the plane 
will ease them.] 
SUBSTITUTE FOR BENDS IN HOT-WATER PIPES. 
“ The glazed stoneware pipes will do very well; iudeed, 
I do not see why they should not supersede iron pipes alto¬ 
gether. The cost is not one-fifth that of iron. They will 
give out the heat more equally, and are less liable to become 
leaky at the joints than iron. I have used them as a sub¬ 
stitute for lead soil pipes with the greatest advantage, and 
when I erect a greenhouse I shall use them instead of iron.” 
—Abel Nott. 
[We have nothing to say against such pipes—quite the 
reverse ; but certainly, if we had iron pipes for a house, we 
should never think of having earthenware pipes for elbows. 
We do not see how they can give out heat more equally, or 
be more sound at the joints, than iron. The first heating by 
hot water we ever saw was done with earthen pipes of a com¬ 
mon kind, and they were so liable to accidents that they were 
soon replaced. The strong glazed ones are a different thing, 
and we would as soon use them as iron on a level surface, 
where no great pressure was on them, and where anything 
like fair play was given them. In giving bottom heat, where 
often a great pressure of water is on the pipes, we should 
rather be afraid to use them ; but for greenhouses, and even 
Vineries, where water circulates on nearly the level of the 
boiler, it is quite different, and for such purposes it would 
be worth while for the makers to turn them out in six- 
feet and nine-feet lengths. We are obliged to our friend 
Abel, and no doubt many amateurs will be.] 
PEACH-HOUSE ARRANGEMENTS. 
“Will you kindly furnish me with information on the 
following subjects ? 
“ 1. Having a Peach house with a back wall nicely built 
with bricks without plaster, would it be the better plan to 
nail the Peach trees to the wall, and train them, as they are 
generally done, against a common garden wall, or to go to the 
expense of a trellis ? If the latter, what kind of trellis 
would be the least expensive ? 
“ 2. Are Peach trees in a Peach house benefited by the 
free admission of the frost in winter, or would it be equally 
good, or better, for them to have the frost just excluded ? 
In the latter case, of course, hardy greenhouse plants, bed¬ 
ding plants, and any hardy plants in pots, to preserve the 
pots from being broken by the frost, could be kept there 
very conveniently. Would Strawberry plants in pots for 
forcing be better kept out of doors and covered, or put into 
such a house near the glass, where the frost is merely 
excluded by a fire to keep the thermometer from falling 
below 33° ? 
“ 3. Would the coldest end of a long Peach house suit a 
Moorpark Apricot tree trained against the end upright glass, 
where nothing is trained under the roof glass to shade it 
from above, and where the door in the same end is always 
open when it cau be with safety?”— Clericus. 
GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION, March 24, 1857. 420 
[1. So far as the well-doing of the Peach trees is con- 
cerned it matters not one iota whether you train them against 
a wall or tie them to a trellis. Out of doors a trellis is often 
anything but an advantage, especially if so far from the wall 
as to admit of a strong current of air between the wall and 
the trees, as thus much of the advantage of the wall, as 
respects extra heat, is lost. In-doors this is of less conse¬ 
quence. The chief drawback to nailing Peach trees to the 
wall of a Peach house is, that in the course of years the wall 
will get well riddled with nail holes, and these, if not 
stopped, will become a harbour for all kinds of pestering 
insects. To guard alike against this annoyance and to keep 
the wall neat and clean we would recommend one of two 
courses. Make a trellis of wire, using it about one-eighth 
of an inch in diameter, strained longitudinally along the 
house about two or three inches from the wall, and at the 
distance of two bricks from wire to wire. Small iron or strong 
wire staples, with a hole large enough for the wire to pass 
through, will keep the wire firm, and at the regular distance 
from the wall. The other plan would be the simplest, 
and, I believe, the cheapest, and is largely adopted by Mr. 
Fleming, of Trentham, and you can merely do a part of your 
wall, if you like, as the trees grow. Metal nails of a good 
size are procured, are heated over a fire in an old shovel, 
kettle, &c., and are then thrown into oil. When cooled and 
dried they are fit for use, and it will be long before they are 
rusted. These are then driven in several inches apart in 
longitudinal rows, and are never extracted, the shoots being 
tied to them as wanted, and just cut away and changed at 
the next pruning and tying. In all new, good walls this 
mode is a great improvement on the old plau of pulling nails 
out, and using fresh nails and shreds, the latter of which 
alone are the best possible receptacles for the eggs of insects. 
By this means the shoots are tied to the nails, and there is 
no continuous pulling of nails out and driving nails in. 
2. This has reference to a vexed question. We have had 
fine crops of Peaches for years in houses that never had the 
frost really admitted, and in which the roofs were fixtures. 
Nevertheless, could we uncover a house six weeks or so in 
autumn, merely guarding against heavy rains, we would do 
so. With or without uncovering, if it were practicable, and 
implied no danger to things that must otherwise be in the 
house, we should like the trees to have several degrees of 
frost, say three or four, or even more, before we had them 
pruned and cleaned, as the frost would arrest everything 
like growth, and be serviceable in giving a quietus to some 
insects that might escape the washing brush. Such a frost 
generally comes by the end of October or the beginning of 
November, and, if practicable, we would keep plants under 
protection until it did come, and the trees were pruned and 
the house cleaned. Without such a precaution, however, 
we have often been obliged to prune the trees and clean the 
house in order to admit such plants as you mention. A 
better hybernatory for them can scarcely be found, and if 
you do not raise the thermometer by fire heat above from 35 3 
to 40° there will bo no danger of starting the Peach trees 
prematurely. 
Strawberries for Forcing. — There are no modes of 
covering out of doors that would suit Strawberries for forcing 
equally well to their standing dry and free from frost in such 
a house; and so long as the house is kept cool it matters 
not whether the plants are near the glass or not. It is after 
they begin to grow, and throw up their flower-trusses, and 
come into bloom, that nearness to the glass, or at least un¬ 
obstructed sunshine and a fair portion of air, are indis¬ 
pensable. Many a well-grown Strawberry plant in a pot 
fails when forced, because the flower-buds had been de¬ 
stroyed by alternate frostings and floodings. The being-in- 
a-pot renders it more subject to vicissitudes from sudden 
changes. Covering with glass sashes, wooden shutters, or 
auy material for throwing off wet, would be the next best 
place to the floor of such a Peach house. We are often 
obliged to try many schemes, because we have not got a 
house at rest at liberty for such a purpose. 
3. We know of nothing to prevent the Apricot succeeding; 
but if the house is wide, in addition to the door, it might be 
advisable to have a few squares in the glass end of the 
house made to open.] 
