51 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, AritiL 24, 1860. 
out of 60,000 scarlets wliicli will be out on the said terraces 
this season, “poor Tom Thumb will hardly find a corner.” 
Mr. Gordon, of these terraces, not he of Chiswick, has 
succeeded Mr. Eyles, and we are to have his style of 
planting next. At the Crystal Palaco perhaps you might 
have seen, for the last two or three years, a man with a 
spade going about on these terraces, and looking the 
very picture of a Lord Chancellor discriminating, but 
you did not know what. He was pulling out the rogues, 
however, by the ears with that very spade. Tom was 
then ticklish, and got himself poked into the beds here 
and there among the Trentham Scarlets, and when that 
happens the intruder is called a rogue in nursery and 
garden language, and is dealt with accordingly. How 
that was is thus explained. 
Mr. Inch, who is now gardener near Greenwich, was at 
Trentham, in the flower garden, and hence took cuttings 
ot this master scarlet to Sydenham in 1855; but being 
not then in the propagating department, his protege 
got mixed with Tom Thumb, and it took a couple of 
years to part the two before I could detect my old friend 
and favourite in 1858. 
The new grass carver, Mr. Summers, who now adver¬ 
tises this superior bedder, was one of the very men who 
allowed Tom and Trentham to mix in the propagation at 
the Palace in 1855. Prom there he went to Forest Hill, 
and got his mother to send him up, from Devonshire, 
whole lumps of native Ferns from where he used to be 
bird’s-nesting, and took prizes with the same at the 
Crystal Palace; and nothing would do but his pals, at 
mixing the Toms, must go and see how his mother packed 
the Ferns. And so it was, when they got there, that he 
had lots of grossularurfolia Geraniums—the very ones 
I mentioned last autumn as being pincushioned by Mr. 
Eyles. Of course, they must have some cuttings of this 
minimum Geranium to take back to the Palace, and, of 
course, also, they must pay for them in kind, and the 
kind most coveted by our pilifera friend, was this very 
Trentham Scarlet. The bargain was struck, and both 
parties struck their respective cuttings. That was how 
that pincushion-bed, and this new superior scarlet came 
to be heard of by the readers of The Cottage Gakdeneb ; 
and if Sir Joseph Paxton had- not been awake to the 
move, and so dropped his Tom Thumbs from his private 
garden, and took the Trentham instead, we of the Ex¬ 
perimental might have cock-crowed, as being the first to 
adopt the improved scarlet, next after the retainers of 
the Crystal Palace authorities ; but now all who can 
afford it will have it, and we may cackle, and “poor 
Tom ” must go the way of all the rest. 
But wait a bit. I sent another on the same journey last 
autumn which will take the shine out of many, but not out 
of this one, or any other known scarlet,—for it is a carmine 
flower, the first of that rich tint. I have not yet seen 
the catalogue in which it is described by my agents, the 
Messrs. Henderson, of the Wellington Road Nursery, 
but my name for it is Carmine Nosegay ; it is not quite 
so strong as Tom Thumb, and would make a row between 
Tom and Imperial Crimson. Most of the catalogues 
speak well of Imperial Crimson, but I only saw in Mr. 
Stark’s catalogue, from Edinburgh, much account of 
the Model Nosegay. I wa3 told that Mr. Pince, of 
Exeter, said last year it was the best Rose Geranium he 
had ever planted. That is just where it will end, but it 
is still one of my own principal breeders. The seedlings 
of Model Nosegay by the pollen of Imperial Crimson are 
still retained in the Experimental Garden for particular 
beds, and there are two match beds of the Model to be 
planted this season ; but then we know exactly the kind 
of soil,—of poor, light, deep, sandy soil,—which will set 
it all a-bloom with very little growth. Again would I 
remind young cross-breeders not to cross a Geranium 
or a Pelargonium that is not fully established in a pot 
or in the soil at the time, and whenever they begin to be 
too leafy out of doors to cease crossing them. 
The month of July is the best time in the year to cross 
bedding Geraniums out of doors, as by that time the check 
from turning out is past, and the succulency from night 
dews is not yet come. My best breeder for this year 
was planted at the end of last September, on Harry 
Moore’s plan, four plants in a box, eighteen inches long, 
a foot deep, and a little more than a foot wide. It is 
tarred inside and out, and no sort of manure is in the soil, 
only the very best yellow loam, lightened a little with 
Cocoa-nut refuse instead of sand. I use it just in the 
same proportion as sand in all my pots. I planted out a 
row of breeders after that first frost in October last, on a 
west border which is covered with glass, and the soil as 
light as possible. The glass will be off when the frost is 
! over, but the breeders will never get too rank, or gross, 
I or succulent there, and they must be watered the first 
season when the weather is long dry; but they, too, are 
to be on Harry Moore’s plan till they are too big or too 
much out of date for my purpose. D. Beaton. 
ROCK GARDENS. 
i In arranging the grounds of villa gardens of some extent, it is 
almost always desirable to introduce some root or roekwork, with 
the view of contrast and variety, and also for the cultivation of 
those ornamental and very interesting plants which can only be 
seen to advantage in such a place. Such are the dwarf Helian- 
1 themums, Oisti, Ferns, Lycopods, and many others. 
In distributing the materials it is extraordinary to see the 
great difference produced by artistic skill, as compared with un- 
artistic arrangement; and it is also astonishing to see the large 
masses of small stones which may be heaped together without 
producing any striking effect. 
There is no greater error committed, I think, than the one so 
often perpetrated, of making large mounds of roekwork close to a 
mansion, having the expression of high art in all its features. But 
I do think that the features of roekwork occurring in quiet and 
secluded natural reoesses are charming, and it is surprising how 
much the effect is heightened by the grouping together of some 
two or three large boulders in such places. There are instances 
of this at Ohatswortb, and at Ashridge, which arc worth the 
j study of the amateur landscape gardener. While the effect pro¬ 
duced by the aggregations of large blocks of stone at Sion House, 
is very fine. 
Let me here advise those who wish to create a grand dis¬ 
play, to work with effective materials, in the shape of very 
large blocks. For it is difficult to convey, by any amalgamation 
of small rubble, the expression of unity which a larger block gives. 
In forming roekwork care should be taken that the materials 
all partake of the same character ; and, perhaps, the prevalence of 
scars on a rocky bank is one of the best subjects for imitation. 
The late Duke of Marlborough formed one of this kind at Blen¬ 
heim, at the end of the lake there, which was one of his chef 
(Voeuvres, and it is at this day much admired. 
We, too, often see mounds of roekwork introduced in places 
where they do violence to the surrounding objects. They would 
be much better in such places by themselves. 
We woidd make an exception where the roekwork is secondary 
for its effect, and is tolerated solely to afford a fitting growth- 
place for plants. Here it is less important as to its picturesque¬ 
ness, But, wherever introduced in retired walks, it should be 
of massive proportions, and appear to be a natural production. 
Water is ever beautiful amongst rocks, and we would advocate 
its introduction always where possible. It is lively, bursting 
out from the side of rocks, and playing from stone to stone, 
sparkling in the bright sunlight, or beaming bright and silvery 
in the moonbeams. 
The materials used by many persons in the formation of rock- 
work are various, and often very incompatible. We have Been a 
mixture of scoria, flints, pieces of rough stone, broken vases, 
sculptured animals and birds, broken plinths and mouldings, 
representing, when put together, the rubbish of a ruined city • 
and having been formed into a mass, they have been planted with 
Saxifragas, Sedums, Erinus, Arabia, and other plants, which 
have soon concealed the most expressive forms of these varied 
objects. 
Wo remember to have seen at the great Laurencian villa, 
Grecian vases set upon pediments of rough flints, which i3 much 
