June 26, 1886) 
THE GARDENING WORLD, 
6 $7 
HDMEA ELEGANS. 
This good old-fashioned plant has for many years 
been a great favourite of my employer on account of its 
peculiar balsamic odour, and, with the exception of some 
two or three seasons, We have always been very suc¬ 
cessful with it. I have been unable to account for our 
want of success in the period named, as we treated 
them the same as before, and as we do now ; but it was 
all to no purpose, the plants seemed to be sick of the 
place or the soil, and grow kindly they would not. 
We sow the seeds early in March in an ordinary pot¬ 
ting compost of good loam, leaf-soil and sharp sand, 
and stand the seed-pots in the Cucumber-house until 
the seedlings are large enough to handle, when we pot 
them singly into small 60-sized pots, and after a few 
days longer in the Cucumber-house to enable them to 
root into the fresh soil, they are transferred to a warm 
frame, and kept close to the glass. This position suits 
them admirably for the first season, but to do them 
well, and keep the foliage on down to the soil, they 
must be frequently syringed, especially on the under¬ 
sides of the leaves to keep down red-spider ; must never 
be neglected in the matter of watering, and must be 
regularly potted on as the'pots get full of roots. We 
never use larger than 8-in. pots, and into this size they 
are shifted by the end of August, by which time they 
will want more head room, and are then put on a shelf 
in a light greenhouse, and in spring are watered occa¬ 
sionally with weak liquid manure. They soon throw 
out their plumes of small rose-coloured blossoms.— 
Horlus. 
--— 
THE STRAWBERRY. 
A celebrated wit (Sidney Smith, I think it was), 
who evidently knew what was good, once facetiously 
remarked that “ God might have made a better fruit 
than a strawberry, but for some reason did not. ” Be 
that as it may; few, however, will attempt to gainsay 
the assertion who understands how very useful a frui t 
it has become in the hands of the skilful horticulturist, 
especially through the winter and spring months, under 
glass. 
Oar honoured ancestors, poor simple souls, who may 
possibly have imagined they were highly favoured with 
most of the good things of this world in their day, 
patiently groped about where Nettles grew, and among 
Thorns in the wood, for the few small Strawberries they 
perchance discovered there ; or assiduously hunted for 
them among the unproductive kinds, which, for con¬ 
venience sake, had been transferred from thence into 
the garden. 
We learn from honest old Tusser’s Five Hundred 
Points of Good Husbandry, written in the time of “Our 
Good Queen Bess,” that the wild and inferior kind was 
then considered “excellent good.’’ This indefatigable 
cultivator—who, from the inferences we draw from his 
famous maxims, appears never to have eaten the bread 
of idleness, but was always “up and doing,” knowing 
that “ the hand of the diligent maketh rich,” seems to 
have found a suitable job for good Dame Tusser too, 
and whom we may fancy was an industrious and frugal 
woman, and thus gives directions how his hopeful 
helpmeet should do it 
“ Wife, into the garden, and set me a plot 
Of Strawberry-roots, the best to be got; 
Such growirg abroad, among Thorns in the wood, 
Well chosen and picked, prove excellent good.” 
Although so many eventful years have rolled over 
the Strawberry-producing world since then, we sin¬ 
cerely hope our right worthy predecessor, honest old 
Master Tusser, and his ivell-beloved wife—who seem to 
have sensibly pulled together, both iu field and garden— 
derived as much real satisfaction in their day, w'hen 
feasting upon the meagre wild wood Strawberries, as 
their successors are doing with the many improved 
varieties they regale themselves with now. 
That Shakespeare, who also refers to them, during 
the reign of the “Virgin Queen,” must undoubtedly 
have often picked them in their umbrageous habitats, 
in the woodlands of Warwickshire and adjacent coun¬ 
ties, we may naturally infer, from thus alluding to them: 
“ The Strawberry grows underneath the nettle ; 
And wholesome berries thrive and ripen best, 
Neighbour’d by fruits of lesser quality. ” 
And to prove how uncommon a sight it was to see 
Strawberries under cultivation in a garden at that 
period, Shakespeare remarks : 
“ My Lord of Ely, when I was last in Holborn, 
I saw good Strawberries in your garden there ; 
I do beseech you send for some of them.” 
This poor and small fruit, about the size of ordinary 
Cranberries, we may suppose, had a slight strawberry 
taste about them, and some of the odour ; and but 
little more, when compared with the deliciously 
flavoured, large, handsome and productive varieties 
under cultivation now. And under the most favourable 
conditions possible, the fruiting season of which must 
have been a brief one. 
The most skilful herbalist of those days, John Gerard, 
who had charge of the botanical garden of the College 
of Physicians in 1587, for the cultivation of rare plants 
of medicinal value, and was maintained at the cost of 
“ forty marks English money ” a year, alludes to only 
three kinds under cultivation in 1597 ; and which 
appear to have been newly introduced from a wild state 
to the gardens, such as they were at that period, and 
thus speaks of them in the quaint phraseology of the 
time: “Strawberries do grow upon hills and vallys, 
likewise in woods, and other such places as be some¬ 
thing shadowie. They prosper well in gardens ; the 
red strawberry everywhere ; and the other two, white 
and green, more rare, and arc not to be found save 
only in gardens.” 
If the mind’s eye will only glance back to the 
rudimentary Strawberry beds of our forefathers, and 
think of what poor miserable sorts they had to make 
shift with, and then look at the thousands of broad 
acres of them in various parts of the country, of such 
splendid varieties as were ever dreamt of, even fifty 
years ago, they will be amazed at the wonderful pro¬ 
gress on every side. Such a gradual state of development, 
or transition, from a lower to a higher type of plant 
life, as has been slowly going on from the time Virgil, 
Ovid, and Pliny first mentioned the Fragaria, or Straw¬ 
berry, until it has finally evolved into the modern 
Keen’s Seedling, Sharpless or Parry, ought to convince 
the most sceptical, that the doctrine of evolution is not 
the myth or chimera they would fain make us believe. 
— IF. T. Harding in Gardeners' Monthly. 
-->X<-- 
TWO WELSH GARDENS. 
Shimdda Hir, Llandudno. 
Shimdda Hir, freely translated “Chimney Long,” 
is the North Wales residence of Samuel Barlow, Esq., 
J.P., of Castleton, near Manchester. It is about two 
miles from Llandudno station, and eastward of Llan¬ 
dudno Bay, lying in a peaceful valley on the road to 
Colwyn Bay. The mansion, which is substantially built, 
elegantly furnished, and filled with many beautiful 
objects of art, that denotes the man of taste, faces the 
north; before it,andnot much above a stone’s throw from 
it, rises the Little Ormeshead, dividing Mr. Barlow’s 
estate from the sea. To the right the road winds away 
to Colwyn Bay, and on the left lies Llandudno, with the 
Great Ormeshead standing out to sea like a huge western 
fortification—a noble pile of mountain, rising up tall 
and strong against the everlasting sky, and as far as 
men know, has so stood for cycles of ages past—and 
between Little and Great Ormeshead lies the beautiful 
Bay of Llandudno, with the Irish Sea stretching away 
until it washes the shore of the Sister Isle. On the left 
of the mansion is a piece of pleasure ground, and a large 
paddock walled in on three sides, and against the walls 
are planted various fruit tree. 
In front of the mansion is the lawn and flower garden ; 
to the right the kitchen garden and offices, and another 
paddock ; behind, a steep hillside rising up to a hill 
crest, which falls again into a fertile valley; and beyond 
this another mountain range of immense extent. On 
the mountain sides, and in the fields, is a great wealth 
of wild flowers. Geranium sanguineum literally hides 
the pasturage from view, so manifold are its blossoms, and 
the Scotch Rose (Rosa spinosissima) is abundant on the 
summits and sides ; some pure white, others white, 
with rosy and crimson spots. It is just the place for 
a wearied man to rest from the cares of business, and 
recruit himself bodily and mentally. The exquisite 
freshness of the air makes the mere act of living and 
breathing a luxury. In the veering sun and shade the 
mountain sides gleam, and the hanging woods darken 
in changing tones, which seem to vary, not only from 
hour to hour, but from moment to moment, and lowest 
of all lies the blue sea in the magnificent bay, that has 
gone on ebbing and flowing for unnumbered ages. 
What a change, to pass from smoke-begrimed Stake- 
hill, -where man’s skill and resource in developing 
plant-life, is but one constant fight against powerful 
opposing forces, to this lovely spot in Wales, where 
plants and flowers flourish with a vigour and beauty as 
fresh as surprising in their lavish wealth of colour. 
That the gardens at Shimdda Hir are well cared for, 
and replete with many things of an attractive and 
interesting character may be assured. One leading 
feature is the Tea-scented and Noisette Roses, and they 
