125 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, May 22, 1860. 
calyx, and F.uteHa arborescuns,” must be obsolete names, or too new to 
get into the broad world of useful knowledge. We can give no guess 
about them. Your Acacias will all do in pots for many years to come. 
They are all worth keeping, and will do out of doors planted in the borders 
all the summer. Many of them change their ways of leafing like the one 
j'ou name. Some of the Cypresses do the same. 
Guano Liquid Manure ( R . Might ). — No guano is equal to the Peruvian, 
and two ounces of it to each gallon of water are strong enough. 
Weedy Lawn (Flora).- —Nothing but continued hand-weeding will 
destroy the Chiclcweed, Dandelions, and Ilawkweed. We fear that you 
sowed Grass seeds that had mixed with them the seeds of weeds. For 
instance : The seeds from a liay-loft are sure to introduce such plagues. 
Grape-hunches Turning Brown (An Amateur, C. F.). —The roots of 
the Vines being outside, whilst there is flue heat within the vinery, and 
the Vines “making wood very fast,’’ point at once to the source of your 
disappointment. The roots are too cold in proportion to the heat in which 
the branches are growing, and cannot supply the sap fast enough. If the 
roots had been inside, and if you had secured slower growth in the Vines 
by a lower temperature, and more free admission of air night and day, the 
bunches would not have turned brown. Give more air, and keep the 
vinery cooler, or your Vines will not ripen their wood so as to give you a 
crop next year. 
Geranium, Petunia, and Verbena Cuttings (£. N. N. 1.—They may 
all be made in September. Trench the ground deeply, and sow' Long-horn 
Carrots ; there is yet time to get a crop. By turning the top spit to the 
bottom, you will bury the vermin. No one can value cow-manure upon 
such data as you state. 
Garden Plan (J. Ashton). —Again we have to say, we never arrange 
gardens, we only criticise the planting submitted to us. You may bed out 
now. 
Chrysanthemums in Pots (C. (?.).—Pinch off the tops; repot them in 
larger pots as often as they fill with roots those they are growing in. 
Water them with liquid manure and soft water on alternate days ; and 
keep the pots, but not the plants, shaded. 
Catalogue or Flowers, Shrubs, &c. (J. 0. C., a Young Gardener).— 
Don’s Bortus Cantabriyiensis which can now be bought from 3s. 6 d. to 
os., will suit you. It is in English, though it has a Latin title. 
Chase’s Beetle Poison (F. Blake).—It may kill woodlice, but of this 
we are not sure, for we do not know whether they will eat it. Slugs will 
not touch it. Peas ripened in 1839 will do for sowing in 1861; but the 
plants from them will not be so vigorous as they would have been in 1860. 
Destroying Slugs (II. B.). —Trench the ground thirty inches deep, 
turning the bottom spit to the bottom of that depth, sprinkle lime over 
that bottom spit, and then fill up the trench. Such trenching will destroy 
all the slugs on the plot so trenched ; but they may visit it from adjoining 
plots, to prevent which, the only remedy is sprinkling lime on the surface, 
or pegging down a hair rope round the plot, which acts as a chevaux de 
frise. 
Cutting Asparagus (It. B.). —If an old stool throws up only very small 
heads, do not cut any of them ; put a litle extra manure to it, and leave 
it uncut from until next season : it is weak. If some of the shoots are 
large, and some very small, cut away all those small as fast as they appear, 
so that the sap may go to promote the serviceable heads. 
Chrysanthemum regalium as a Bedder (J. Lynes). —Y’our double 
yellow flower is Chrysanthemum regalium flore plena, and is as good for 
beds where the soil suits it, as any Calceolaria, which is about one place 
out of five or six hundred. It is one of the easiest plants to propagate and 
to keep over the winter. In most places it grows out of bounds—two to 
three feet high, and needs to be trained down to the ground. We have 
had it richer than any other yellow bedder, and we had to cast it to the 
dogs in another place. It has been often mentioned in the earlier volumes 
of The Cottage Gardener. The single form of it is a wild-looking weed 
like Chrysanthemum tricolor, but both of them sport a little, and some 
very nice things for ribbon-rows might be picked up among them. As a 
seventh or eighth row at the back of a ribbon-border, and next to tall 
Dahlias, this C. regalium Jtore pleno standing upright, and its weedy- 
loolting bottom hid by the rows in front of it, would be just right, and tire 
brightest flower one could have so far from the eye. That is the right 
place for it, or in the centre of a very largejlower-bed. You will find it 
in every good list or catalogue of bedding plants. 
Spergula subulata.— Mr. J. A. Summers, Howard Fark Nursery, 
Perry nill, Sydenham, will be obliged by J., Ashwicken,” communi¬ 
cating with him. Mr. Summers wishes to exchange S. pi/i/era plants for 
plants of ii\ subulata. 
Liquid Manure to Flowers (A Great Admirer ).—Apply it by placing 
the nose of the unrosed watering-pot near the ground among the plants. 
Flowers Blooming Early (I ’orkshire).— The list at page 100 was fur¬ 
nished us by a clergyman near Bristol. 
POULTRY AND BEE-KEEPER’S CHRONICLE. 
POULTRY SHOWS. 
May 23d and 24th. Beveui.ey' and East Biding of Yorkshire. Sec., 
Mr. Fras. Calvert, Surgeon, &c. Entries close May 17th. 
June 6th, 7th, and 8th. Bath and West op England. At Dorchester. 
See., J. Kingsbury, Esq., llammet Street, Taunton. Entries close May 7. 
June 12th. Essex (Saffron Walden). Sec., Mr. Kobert Emson, Slough 
House, Halstead, Essex. Entries close June 1st. 
June 20th. Thorne. Sec., Mr. Joseph Richardson, 
June 29th. Driffield. Sec., Mr. R. Davison. Entries close June 23rd. 
June 29th and 30th, July 2nd and 3rd. Sheffield. Chairman, Mr. Wil¬ 
son Overend, Sheffield. Entries close June 14th. 
July 18th and 19th. Merthyr Tydyil. Sec., Mr. W. II. Harris, 142, 
High Street, Merthyr. 
July 19th. Prescot. Sec., Mr. J. Becsley. Entries close July 7. 
August 22nd and 23rd. Settle (Yorkshire). Hon. Secs., Revs. J. R. 
Blakiston and J. Robinson, Settle. Entries close August 1st. 
September 19th, 20th, and 21st. Portsmouth. Hon. Sec., Mr. E. Clarke, 
26, Wish Street, Southsea, Hants. Entries close August 11. 
September 23th. Bridgnorth. Sec., Mr, Richard Taylor, Bridgnorth. 
SELL YOUR SPARE CHICKENS. 
It may bo some of our readers are disposed to try tbe market 
we recommended in our last paper. "We advise them to do so at 
once, if they mean to do so at all. Time is passing, chickens are 
growing, and every day will make them of less value because more 
plentiful. Let the chickens be killed in the forenoon, laid out in 
the coolest place you have till they are quite cold, then put in a 
hamper of the proper size to hold them, packed in stiff wheat 
straw, and sent by night mail-train, so that they will be delivered 
in tire market early in the morning. This must be seen to, 
because if they arrive after market, and have to wait till the 
following day, they lo9e their freshness, and with it half their 
value. To be valuable, especially in warm weather, chickens 
should reach the market while they are stiff. These precautions 
are just a9 necessary for other markets as for London, and when 
anything is sent for sale, it may as well command the best as 
an inferior price. 
COCHIN-CHINA HENS AS MOTHERS. 
I told you I differed from you as to the merits of Cochin- 
Chinas as mothers. One of mine, hatched in June last, kept her 
brood for four months. She then laid again, and became broody 
after laying only a few eggs. She sat and hatched, but the cold 
killed all her brood but one. A month since she began to lay 
again. The solitary chicken is always with her, either on the 
nest, or sitting upon her back. It was hatched on the 27th day 
of February. When the hen is again disposed to sit I shall be 
obliged to part them forcibly.—W. 
DIARRHCEA IN HENS. 
Within the last few months I have lost, at least, a dozen hens 
(more than half my stock), from a disease which appears to be a 
severe diarrhoea. Building has been going on during the time, 
and I imagine it is from something they eat connected with that 
process. Not, I think, paint. Since they have been shut up, no 
cases have occurred ; but one hen getting loose, was, in the course 
of the day, seized with the disease. No cocks have been affected. 
The feathers about the rump get matted together, and a white 
liquid is constantly passed by the hen.—J. E. W. 
[There can be no doubt the hens pick up something that is 
unwholesome and that scours them. Paint has not that effect; 
when they eat that, the head and comb turn black, and they die 
in about twenty-four hours. We have no doubt, if you observe 
closely, you will ascertain what it is they eat. Your treatment 
must be—give a table-spoonful of castor oil, and then (o give 
chalk, plain salt, and bread and ale. The feathers that get matted 
together should be cut off’ close to the skin.] 
GAME COCK WITH NERVOUS AFFECTION OF 
THE LEGS—YELLOW LEGS IN GAME FOWLS. 
Some little while ago, I purchased a pen of Game (Black-reds), 
in the north—first-prize birds (at Darlington and Bradford), 
advertised in your paper by a Mr. Akroyd. Will you kindly 
answer the following queries, and oblige? After 1 had them 
about a fortnight, I observed the cock began to look unhealthy, 
and showed it especially in his feet and thighs. He throws out 
his legs in a kind of kicking way, as if they were tied at the top, 
and he finds it very difficult to walk. He is also very bad in the 
stomach, and the emissions are of a bad colour. He has been 
like this more than a month, but has a capital appetite lor soft 
food, grass, &c. I have tried all kinds of medicines (including 
castor and cod-liver oil), but of little use, and his feathers droop. 
Can you advise me what to do for him ? 
Do you consider yellow-legged Black-reds are altogether ob¬ 
jectionable in the South and West of England Shows for prize 
birds ?— J. G. Price. 
[We fancy tbe cock lias been injured in the back. That 
would account for his difficulty in walking, and the spasmodic 
action you mention. The disordered state of i.is bowels may be 
accounted for by his inability or his lack of inclination to take 
exercise, and seek proper helps for digestion. The only treat¬ 
ment we can recommend in this case, also, is castor oil given 
freely,—a table-spoonful every other day, and continued till he 
no longer passes green slime. He must, when thoroughly purged, 
