229 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, July 10 , 1800. 
many years when the “ good heart and willing hand” lack the 
power to bo efl'eelive; and then how welcome is the weekly 
allowance from the friendly society. 
We have said that gardeners may become unhealthy through 
carelessness, and in this wo speak advisedly; for very rarely is 
there an imperative necessity to rush from the stove into an 
exposure to cold air; never is there any need to train trees in 
bitterly cold weather; and quito as needless is it for a coat or 
waistcoat to be thrown on to the damp soil or grass to be resumed 
wet when the toil is over. Such recklessness is courting the 
attack of rheumatism.—E ds. C. G.] 
PLANTING PEACH TREES AGAINST A WALL. 
PEACH TEEES FAILING—EFFECTS OF LAST IVINTEE. 
In a late number, in his very excellent “ Gleanings from 
Kimpton Hoo,” Mr. Fish describes the Peach-wall being tilled 
by riders and dwarfs, saying that had ho a new wall to fill ho 
would follow this plan, and keep the trees small. Now, I shall 
be much obliged if he will say at what distance each rider is to 
bo placed, and if one or two dwarfs are to be between them. My 
wall is 12 feet high.— Greenhorn. 
[In answer we reply that the Peach-wall.at Ivimpton IIoo is 
9 feet in height, and without coping of any kind. The standards, 
or riders, are planted 18 feet apart. If the wall were higher, 
Mr. Cox would plant them closer in proportion. One dwarf is 
placed between each two riders, and consequently also 18 feet 
from dwarf to dwarf. In some cases the dwarfs reach the top of 
the wall between the riders—that is, the central part of the tree; 
but Mr. Cox prefers keeping both standards and riders so much 
at home by pruning that both together shall cover the wall. 
The means of protecting have alroady been referred to ; and the 
wall is well supplied with fruit and fine wood for the whole of 
its length. We have, also, already mentioned that the position 
is low and warm, near water, and therefore liable to the effects of 
autumn and spring frosts, and yet the trees have escaped all 
injury ; whilst others, and our own among the rest, have suffered 
severely, if not irremediably. 
I had a fine, full crop of fruit last season, and the wood for 
this season seemed everything in October that could bo desired. 
Then came the warm nights—temperature averaging 60°—which 
caused the trees to make fresh growth, and to be charged to 
repletion with juices. When the sudden and severe frosts seized 
them I was apprehensive all the winter that the trees would 
suffer severely, as I detected many blotches and cracks that the 
frost had made. In cutting in spring care was taken to get rid 
of the worst parts, and the blossom came finer and bolder than 
I expected. The fruit set thickly, and the trees seemed as if 
they would get over it so well that I saw no hazard in disbudding, 
and all went on pretty well until that terrible stormy Saturday, 
which almost completely cleared the trees of foliage ; and their 
old wood, and young wood too, became blotched with canker 
and gum, and kept fading and dying off. Even as to the wood 
yet alive, and set thick with fruit, I question if enough of healthy 
wood will be made to swell the fruit off of a good size and flavour; 
and I fear that the greatest care will fail to render the trees at 
all symmetrical so as to fill the wall again. Now, in the case of 
small trees, it would be an easier matter in warm autumns to 
arrest mere growth by exposing or cutting the roots, as well as 
by lessening the leaf surface, so that when severe frost came it 
would not find young shoots gorged with sap to rupture and split 
the sap vessels ; and if some did sutler greatly, the space would 
be more easily filled up. 
The most careful will be caught at times, and wo fear that 
few could attend to everything in that terrible night of October, 
when the thermometer so suddenly sunk some 40°, and gave us 
the almost instantaneous transition from midsummer to mid¬ 
winter. The storms this season were had enough, but this frost 
in October I believe to have been the primary cause of this and 
many similar disasters. 
As one evidence of this I may mention that a part of the same 
wall had been improvised into a temporary orchard-house by 
placing some spare sashes against it, and these were not removed 
until November. The trees on this part were therefore so far pro¬ 
tected from that first terrible frost. I must also mention that the 
same trees had the sashes placed against them before that stormy 
Saturday. Partly on both accounts, but chiefly owing to the 
protection in October, I imagine, these trees have continued to 
grow pretty freely, and have not lost their loaves, nor cankered, 
nor gummed, like those on the open wall. 
All these considerations lead to tho importance of coveving all 
such trees with glass in exposed places in our now uncertain 
climate. Even in a profit point of view there can be no com¬ 
parison as to tho advantages of a Peach-houso when contrasted 
with the open wall; and in a house it is as easy to retard as to 
advance the time of ripening, and thus tho season of such fruit is 
greatly prolonged. 
Peaches were not the only things that suffered from tho frost. 
Previously, formally a year, I hardly ever knew what it was to 
lose a Dahlia root, and that simpily by placing earth or litter over 
their crowns. In tho bustle of tho previous afternoon, which 
showed signs of what was coming, Dahlias were left, and I did 
so because I had never known them greatly injured by the first 
night’s frost. However, though tho roots in the ground were 
safe enough, a great portion of the buds or crowns were irreme¬ 
diably injured. 
As bearing on tho same subject, and also as showing that such * 
early frost is ruinous in proportion to the vigour of growth at the 
time, and, consequently, to the suddenness with which it comes 
in severity, I may mention that I lost almost entirely my earliest 
quarter of Cabbages, and managed to secure a fine second quarter, 
more from necessity and accident than purpose or design. As the 
ground for this successional supply could not be got ready in 
time, the young plants wore pricked out a few inches apart on a 
border, and when transferred to tho quarter had not begun to 
take to their new quarters before tho frost came. In other 
words, instead of being green, succulent, and growing freely, they 
were rather welted and drooping in their appearance; and through 
tho winter, though they just kept their place, they gave little 
promise of the fine yield they afterwards produced, as they grew 
with great rapidity as soon as the days lengthened and became a 
little warm. In looking at some of the cottage gardens in winter, 
I almost envied them their nice green-looking plants, but these 
yellow-welted things, planted so late, beat them hollow before 
cutting time.* But for this late planting I should have had to 
wait for Cabbages from seed sown in a hotbed and hardened off, 
which many others have had to do this season. 
On the same principle, I believe that if there should be a like¬ 
lihood of severe early frosts coming so quickly on the heels of 
warm summer weather, means will have to be taken in many 
places to arrest the growth of Peach trees against open walls, 
before such frost assails them. If such operations should ho 
necessary, then comparatively small trees, with the branches at 
no great distance from the main stem, will be more easily operated 
upon, and regulated according to their requirements and circum¬ 
stances. So many Peach trees have suffered in the country thi3 
season, that the subject is well worth ventilating. Failures, 
rightly regarded, ought to be as instructive as instances of 
success. Without permission, it would be unfair to mention 
instances where tho trees have suffered greatly. There can bo 
no impropriety in stating, that those under my care on the open 
wall are by no means what I would wish them to be. I know 
cases in which, under different gardeners, the Peach trees on the 
open wall never fail and hardly ever get unhealthy. I know of 
other cases in whicli different and first-rate gardeners fail to suc¬ 
ceed in growing them, though succeeding admirably under glass. 
What can be tho chief reasons ?—R. Fish.] 
THE SCIENCE OF GARDENING. 
(.Continued from page 215.) 
THE FLOWER. 
The organs of fructification are absolutely necessary, and are 
always producible by garden plants properly cultivated. They 
may bo deficient in leaves, stems, or roots, because other organs 
may supply their places; but plants are never incapable of 
bearing flowers and seeds, for without these they can never fully 
attain the object of their creation—-the increase of their species. 
Every flower is composed of one or more of the following 
parts—viz., the calyx, which is usually green and enveloping 
the flower whilst in the bud; the corolla or petals, leaves so 
beautifully coloured, and so delicate in most flowers ; the stamens, 
or male portion of the flower secreting the pollen, or impregnat¬ 
ing powder; the pistils, or female portion, impregnatable by 
tho pollen, and rendering fertile tho seeds; and lastly, tho 
pericarp or seed-vessel, 
