412 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
February 27, 1886. 
just as they commence to make growth is the best time 
for the purpose ; he particularly careful not to damage 
the young roots in the operation. 
FORCING HOUSES. 
The advice given last week with regard to the 
"Vineries and Peach-houses must be repeated, disbud¬ 
ding, tying, heeling-in, and so on, each in its order as 
required. Where the early Vines are in flower, and 
this dull cheerless weather continues, it will be advisable 
to maintain a higher day temperature—say, 75° with 
a fall of 5° by night; look well to the fertilising for 
fear of a failure, which may very easily occur while the 
outer elements are so unfavourable to the production 
of pollen. In the later houses simply keep things 
going, and do not attempt much forcing. March 
will very shortly be here, and with its advent we have 
reasonable hope of more sun, and consequently, also, 
of a more rapid and favourable growth of all forced 
subjects. 
The Asparagus roots which were placed on the 
renewed hot-bed are pushing through well, and as soon 
as they can be spared the roots will be removed from 
the other half of the pit, the bed prepared in the same 
way, and another batch put in. Introduce Sea Kale, 
Chicory, and such like into the Mushroom-house as 
required, and, if wanted, one more lot of Rhubarb roots 
may be introduced, after which a slight covering of any 
light material on the stools outside will give the 
requisite supply. 
If not done as advised, put in a good batch of dwarf 
pot Roses at once into the intermediate house. These 
will be found most useful for decorating the conserva¬ 
tory, as they will stand now when brought on steadily. 
Spireas and all such subjects must not be forgotten, 
but still introduced more sparingly now, as few, if any, 
will fail; and where the Lilium eandidum is forced, be 
sure and do not unduly excite, or the spike will become 
blind. 
Through the material not being quite fit, we did not 
make up the last Mushroom-bed as we hoped to do at 
the latter end of last week ; but we have done so to-day, 
and as we have the previously-spawned bed just showing, 
we are not in any immediate concern as to failure in 
supply, which just now is abundant and of extra good 
quality. "Where room can be found, Mustard and Cress 
will be found to come much more satisfactory sown on 
the border of any forced house in rows, simply sifting 
a little waste potting soil to sow on ; it is less liable 
also to damp off. 
THE KITCHEN GARDEN. 
As little or no rain has fallen within the past few 
days, so w r e have been enabled to make a considerable 
advance in out-door work ; the vacant plots are all 
turned up leaving us free to attend to the planting of 
Sea-kale, Horse-radish, Shallots, Garlic, and other 
subjects which will no longer bear neglect if they are 
to succeed, so they must be seen to at once. Although 
we have not had rain we have not enjoyed much sun, 
nor has there been any drying wind to make the 
ground in a fit state to receive seed, so we are rather 
reluctantly compelled to remain idle in this respect, 
which is preferable to courting failure. "We are now 
proceeding with the pruning of the Gooseberry bushes, 
and if the birds do attack them we must sprinkle them 
with lime-wash before digging, which will help to stay 
them. 
If not already done, look to the seed Potato store, if 
lying thickly together they will make growth and 
become matted to the serious injury of the sets, and 
consequently of the crop ; where the practice is followed 
of cutting off the lower end of the seed or set, let this 
be done now and so save time when planting ; Potato 
sets of very firm texture are in my opinion benefitted by 
thiscutting. Wlierethe sets have made too much growth 
instead of rubbing off, cut off to within i in. of the set, 
particularly in the case of early varieties. 
"We have staked and tied all the standard roses so as 
to prevent the March winds from damaging them, and 
to make them look more tidy, we also take advantage of 
all spare time to roll verges, so that they may be got firm 
before the edging knife will be used, by this means a 
much cleaner face is given to the cut ; roll walks and 
lawns (particularly the former) after rains, as unless a 
good face is got now it is quite hopeless to keep one 
during the summer ; turn gravel walks where necessary. 
Walter Child , Croome Court. 
ORCHID ROTES AND GLEANINGS. 
Phalsenopsis Stuartiana Lendyana. —We 
are glad of the opportunity to give an illustration of 
this extraordinary and beautiful variety, which has 
again flowered in Major Lendy’s collection at Sunbury 
House, Sunbury-on-Thames, thus proving itself con¬ 
stant in its peculiarity, not only in individual flowers, 
but in every flower produced on the plant; and answer¬ 
ing the question which was raised on its first flowering. 
It will be seen by our illustration that Major Lendy’s 
Stuartiana makes an attempt to form what is called a 
regular flower ; the column is straighter than in the 
normal form ; the sepals are arranged more equally, 
and the two side petals make good advances towards 
making themselves equal to the lip, by exhibiting in 
lesser degree the tooth-like processes, the narrow base, 
some of the marking, and other characteristics of that 
organ. 
The fact of such a freak becoming constant, suggest 
thoughts as to what might, in the course of'time, take 
place were its progeny to continue to move in the 
direction it has so decidedly advanced so far. In time, 
probably, we should get Phaltenopsis with the three 
large segments all equal, and resembling the petals of 
a Calochortus. The flowers are pure white, spotted 
with rich dark red, the petals and labellum being 
slightly tinged with yellow at the base. Major Lendy, 
who grows these plants well, has now a good show of 
the different varieties of P. Stuartiana, P. Sanderiana, 
P. rosea, P. amabilis, P. Schilleriaua, and P. grandi- 
flora. 
Oncidium Brunleesianum. — This extra¬ 
ordinary and exceedingly rare Orchid is now in bloom 
with R. B. Lemon, Esq., Moat Lodge, Beckenham. The 
plant in habit and general appearance is exactly like 
a stout 0. sarcodes. The flowers are densely set on an 
ascending much-branched spike, gracefully curved over 
at the point; in form and colour they are unlike any¬ 
thing else we know. The plant at Moat Lodge has a 
grand spike of over 150 flowers ; the sepals are primrose 
colour, and the petals, which spread flat, are of the 
same tint, but are faintly barred with light brown. 
The labellum, which is the showy portion of the flower, 
is very singularly arranged for an Orchid, in that for 
two-thirds or more of its length it juts straight out 
from the centre of the flower, the side lobes curving 
upwards until they meet, thus forming a tube. This 
portion is bright yellow, and from it the middle tongue¬ 
like lobe abruptly turns down, presenting in striking 
contrast its rich maroon colour. The sepals also are 
very curious, the top one clipping close over the column, 
and further protecting it by covering the lap between 
the tube-like portion of the lip, the lower ones are only 
separated at the extreme point by a slit like that in 
a quill pen. Altogether it is a very quaint and lovely 
plant. 
The Odontoglossums and Dendrobes, too, are well 
cultivated at Moat Lodge, the former being especially 
stout and healthy in their pretty house with Fern 
rockery, and many are in bloom or bud ; but one—a 
superbly formed large fringed flower, exquisitely 
marbled and tinged with mauve—is equal to the best 
known in its class. Some well-flowered pans of the 
Chatsworth Ccelogyne cristata, many fine Dendrobium 
"Wardianum, D. heterocarpum, D. Ainsworthii, D. 
nobile pendulum (true), D. crassinode, Sophronitis 
grandiflora, Zygopetalum rostratum, some Cattleya 
Triante, and a profusion of lovely spikes of Phalaenopsis 
Schillerianum and P. amabilis make a charming display, 
the like of which could not possibly be got at this 
season in any class of plants beside the Orchids. 
-->£<-- 
CARNIVOROUS PLANTS. 
At a recent meeting of the Ealing Microscopical and 
Natural History Society, Professor Boulger, F.L.S., 
F.G.S., delivered a lecture on “Carnivorous Plants.” 
Alluding to the fact that the day before had been the 
seventy-seventh anniversary of the birth of the greatest 
of English naturalists, Charles Darwin, the lecturer 
began by drawing attention to the fact that of the 
multifarious topics which that great observer elucidated, 
as bearing on his theory of “ Natural selection,” few 
were more fascinating than that of insectivorous or car¬ 
nivorous plants. It used to be said, that one of the 
differences between plants and animals was, that 
animals were capable of taking in solid food, while 
plants were not; but it was only true in a very limited 
sense that animals took in solid food. They did, it is 
true, take solid food into the stomach, but before it 
could be taken into the tissues and blood it must 
become liquid ; whilst there were plants, such as the 
Pitcher plants, which possessed organs quite as much 
entitled to be called a stomach as was that of the little 
Hydra, or fresh-water polyp. The food of animals and 
plants alike, had to undergo a process of fermentation 
before it was capable of assimilation, and it was re¬ 
markable that, to effect this, there were four chief sub¬ 
stances, known as “ ferments, ” which were practically 
identical in the plant and the animal: first in the 
saliva was a ferment known as ‘ ptyalian ’ which con¬ 
verted starch into a soluble form of sugar, parallelled 
among plants by the ‘ diastase,’ by which the embryo 
in a grain of corn was enabled to live like a parasite 
upon the starch stored up in the seed, and by a ferment 
known as ‘azerin’ in the secretion of the Pitcher plant; 
second, the ‘ pepsin ’ produced by the glands of the 
stomach which acted upon the albuminoid or nitro¬ 
genous elements of food, and was parallelled not only 
by ‘ droserin,’ a substance found in the Pitcher plants 
and Sun-dews, but also by ferments found in peas and 
other seeds, and elsewhere in various plants ; third, an 
emulsive ferment acting upon fatty substances, con¬ 
verting them into ‘emulsions,’ i.e. fluids with minute 
suspended particles, and changing them into glycerine 
and fatty acids by a process of saponification. Such a 
ferment exists in many seeds. Fourth, the ‘inverting’ 
ferment, so called because it was found that even cane- 
sugar (though a soluble, crystalloid substance) could 
not be assimilated by either animals or plants before it 
had been converted into other forms of sugar in which 
the action of polarised light was inverted. The pro¬ 
cesses of digestion were thus identical in plants and 
animals, and were not confined to the so-called car¬ 
nivorous plants, whose chief peculiarity was that they 
exuded their digestive fluids, so that digestion took 
place on the outer surface of the leaf. There were 
whole groups of plants which lived exclusively upon 
organic matter, such as the fungi and other plants 
destitute of greeu colouring-matter. These were, 
therefore, exactly like ordinary animals in their nutrition. 
A series of slides were then thrown upon the screen 
by the lime-light lantern, beginning with a group of 
micro-fungi, such as the Yeast Plant and Moulds. 
Some plants, the lecturer continued, have the habit of 
catching flies without apparently using them as food, 
as the Campions and Catcliflies and the little three¬ 
fingered Saxifrage, common in the south-west of 
England. The Teazle has been termed “ the English 
pitcher-plant,” from the accumulation of rain-water, 
in which insects are often drowned at the base of its 
united leaves ; but though Dr. Francis Darwin once 
thought that he detected protoplasmic filaments pro¬ 
jecting from glands on the stem into this water and 
absorbing the animal matter, this idea is now aban¬ 
doned. The truly carnivorous plants belong to widely 
different groups of dicotyledonous flowering plants and 
occur in all parts of the world ; but they are all either 
submerged or marsh plants, with but a slightly 
