390 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, September 21, 1858. 
seeds; Trentham Hose, which, was wrong,—properly, it 
was Trentham Scarlet ; but the tallies might have 
been changed, for Trentham Rose stood just above, 
with the wrong name of La Titien for Le Titian. 
Mr. Conway next, with Royalist, Cerise, Master¬ 
piece, one of the best bedders of that section ; General 
Pelissier, the best pot plant of the same race; 
Brillante ; and a rosy kind, wrongly named Cherry 
Chech Improved. It is not eyen of the same race as 
Cherry Cheek. 
Mr. Summers, gardener to A. Mongredien, Esq., Forest 
Hill, stood next, with Cerise, Beauty of Chepstoiv, Tom 
Thumb, Trentham Scarlet, somebody’s Queen, and a 
real Binh Nosegay at last. I never saw or heard of it 
before. There were excellent plants in the next col¬ 
lection, but so misnamed, and the names so badly 
spelt, that charity compels me to withhold the names 
of the gardener and master. 
Mr. Brown, gardener to J. C. Thurn, Esq., Dulwich, 
stood next for Bedding Geraniums, and had a prize 
for Pink Bet, Punch, Master Squires, Tom Thumb, 
Cerise, and Kingsbury Pet, —all nice plants. Mr. 
Elliot, gardener to Mr. Barnes, Lower Sydenham, had 
the next lot, of which the Cottage Maid was different 
from the above. Mr. Lavey, gardener to E. A. 
De Grave, Esq., Fetcham, Surrey, stood next. He 
had Shrubland Dwarf and Frogmore Improved, 
different,--the dwarf quite true. I should like to have 
it, as it is four times better at Shrubland Park than 
Tom Thumb. Mr. Reid, gardener to J. Hunt, Esq., 
Sydenham, came next. He had Bigleys Queen, Mr. 
Rickets, different,—all nice plants. * Mr. Walters, 
gardener to J. Moore, Esq., Sydenham, next. He 
had the best kind of Scarlet there—the Beckenham 
Scarlet ; but some others were bad kinds. After him 
Mr. Halley, with five or seven plants in one pot ; but 
some of the gardeners were just as unscrupulous. Mr. 
Durant, gardener to R. Hutchinson, Esq., had the first 
prize, with Brillante, Le Titian, Tom Thumb, Cerise, 
Trentham Rose, and Punch,— not the true Punch, but 
one of its seedlings. Mr. Gray, gardener to W. 
.Ricardo, Esq., next, but none different. Mr. Weather- 
hill next. He had Little David, a dwarf Tom Thumb ; 
Scarlet Perfection, a green Horseshoe ; Queen of Fnq- 
land ; and Punch, but not true. 
How, all these beautiful plants were so much of 
lo\e s labour lost. Pink Pet and Kingsbury Pet were 
the only two kinds of pot plants in the whole lot; the 
l est were bedders, and not one quarter so telling as 
the vases of Tom Thumb out of doors. But I forgot 
to speak to Sir Joseph Paxton about showing bedders 
not trained, nor less nor more than six plants of one 
xmd m one box, and the exact size of the box to be 
given. Whoever transgressed that rule should be 
disqualified. . I hope Mr. Grove, the secretary, will 
pomt out this suggestion to “ the gardener’s best 
friend. 
Three splendid nosegays of Violets, from John 
INewton, Thornton Heath, Croydon, should have been 
sent to Balmoral, to Her Majesty, they were so de¬ 
liciously sweet. 
Mr. J. C Schmidt, of Erfurt, in Prussia, well known 
among btock growers here, had an entire new feature 
in the nosegay line, which attracted very general at¬ 
tention, and deservedly so. His are Hosegays of 
Everlasting Flowers, and of flowers and moss, 
dried by an entirely new process, which renders 
them durabic for years.” His only agent in England is 
Mr Herrmann of Ann’s Place, Walthamstow, Essex. 
in f iake ’ these nosegays are far superior to 
Covent Garden make. They are just the things for 
5*° burner-table and the drawing-room in the dead of 
wi ter ’ ^ fi mte so good as those we have 
made thousands of at Shrubland Park. 
In the Miscellaneous, the Messrs. Jackson had a 
handsome prize for a fine specimen of Berberis tri- 
furcata, exhibited in bloom for the first time in 
Europe. It had a tassel of thirteen upright flower- 
spikes, of deep orange yellow, and from four to six 
inches long on the top of the leading shoot. It 
will not seed, and it was in bloom a month before the 
Show. It is worth knowing, that seeds of this Eastern 
broad-leaved Berberis will vegetate in ten days, if 
sown as soon as ripe, while the seeds of some kinds 
take from six to twelve months to sprout. 
Miss Dolphin, of Sydenham Hall, had an unworthy 
prize for the best and scarcest bulb in Europe,—a 
bulb which was never before exhibited, in public, in 
England. But we have no judges of rare bulbs. 
This was Vallota purpurea major, and I doubt if 
there were two gardeners at the Show who ever saw it 
before. The name is in everybody’s mouth, and in 
every bulb list, but I question if there is a bulb of it 
on sale in Great Britain. The one which is sold for it, 
and which goes by its name, is the kind which was in 
Air. Carson’s collection. But the two are as different as 
the two kinds of Amaryllis Belladonna. This had two 
strong flower-stems, and eight flowers on each. . The 
common Vallota has never more than six, and oftener 
four or five. 
Air. Summers, gardener to A. Mongredien, Esq., 
Forest Hill, had a prize for a collection of mixed 
Succulents, chiefly Cacti. 
But the greatest novelty was the Hybrid Orchids, 
from the Messrs. Vcitch. A cross from Calanthe ve- 
ratrifolia, by the pollen of C. Masuca , is the best of 
them. It shows exactly what takes place in other 
tribes when the pollen of a coloured flower is applied 
to a white one,—the white takes very nearly the tinge 
of the pollen parent. The peculiar purple of Masuca 
is the colour of this cross,, but the habit and stature is 
that of the mother. It is called Dominiana, after their 
foreman, who does these wonders. There were also 
three kinds of cross Caltleyas, between granulosa and 
Harrisonia. They are not so fine as either of their 
parents, but they may increase in beauty as they get 
older and stronger. There, is not the slightest doubt 
about Oncidiums, Dendrobiums, Epidendrums, and all 
the great families, sporting like Calceolarias ; nor that 
nine-tenths of theprideof botanists,thespecies, are mere 
seedling varieties, which varieties get fixed in time by 
local influences. There is not such a thing in nature 
as a species, as meant by botanists. The Shrubland 
scarlet Geranium will produce three distinct species, 
and each of the three will reproduce the same, but 
neither of them will give a variety, and I know twenty 
kinds of Scarlet Geraniums which will come as true 
fi om seeds as Barley and Oats. They had also a lovely 
plant of Lapageria rosea, trained in their own original 
parasol fashion, the flowers hanging down from the 
run of the parasol as thick as they could stand. The 
present fashion of hiding young ladies faces, by the 
dangles from the rim of their hats, is a hybrid be¬ 
tween the training of the Messrs. Veitch and the 
Sultan s scruples. 
But I must leap, for want of room, and see the 
Tuchsias, where Mr. Webb, gardener to H. Walmsley, 
.ff’Tulse Hill, took the best prize, with the afore¬ 
said Marquis of Bristol, Pearl of Fngland being on 
hi3 right and the Duchess of Lancaster on his left, or 
rather on my left. Directly behind him, and much 
hidden by his bulk, stood my own favourite Fuchsia, 
Venus de Medici, having Lnaccessible on her left and 
Nit Desperandum (a climber) on the right. 
, Mr. Oubridge, gardener to J. Foster, Esq., Stain- 
lord Hilf, was second. He placed them two and two, 
thus—Venus de Medici and General Williams in 
front, 1 nnce Albert and Clio next, and Autocrat and 
