56 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
September 24, 1887. 
BROMPTON STOCKS. 
I hate just recently been planting out, on a warm 
dry south border, a quantity of Giant White and 
Scarlet Brompton Stocks, though after many years’ 
experience of the effects of our winters upon these 
favourite flowers, I must say that the planting seems 
indulging in an almost forlorn hope. Really, these 
Giant Bromptons are so beautiful and so fine, that one 
gives up their cultivation only with regret. Possibly in 
some favoured localites they winter well, but we want to 
see them in all their beauty in our cottage and other 
gardens, where they seem always to figure, when found, 
with such exceeding fitness. 
Not all the flowers of Ind, or the perfumes of Araby. 
will ever destroy in our minds an innate love for the 
True Giant Brompton Stock, especially of its noble 
double form. I pulled a few through the winter last 
year by putting them into pots and keeping them in a 
cold house, but the result was hardly satisfactory, as 
the plants of course get stunted in the pots, and after 
being planted out at the end of March or in April, seem 
too late to make growth essential to the production of 
fine spikes. Some years, perhaps, the plants have been 
got out too early, and have become too robust. Last 
year a fine breadth of the Giant White put out in the 
open had every plant killed. 
If I cannot keep them through the winter on a warm 
dry south border under a high wall; I do not well know 
what position outdoors will protect them. The plants 
are firmer and later owing to the drought, and possibly 
they may survive, as I trust they may.— A. D. 
-- 
DISEASES OF PLANTS. 
Whiting to Dr. Thudicum, who early in the year 
gave a series of lectures at the Society of Arts, on the 
diseases of plants, with special regard to agriculture 
and forestry, Mr. Edmund Tonks says :—When com¬ 
paratively but little versed in the art of horticulture, 
the plants under my care grew to great perfection ; 
now, with sixty years’ practical experience in cultiva¬ 
tion, and much study of the laws which regulate 
growth, in the country ten miles away from town, my 
pi nts, however easy may be their cultivation under 
ordinary circumstances, are miserable failures, more 
especially those grown under glass. I have about 200 
ft. run of glass, divided into eight houses, in which an 
attempt is made to cultivate many varieties, including 
ropical fruit and Orchids. Your remarks as to 
Mignonette suffering from a rhizoctonia being so 
entirely in accordance with my own views, that the 
mischief was caused by some low form of life, either 
vegetable or animal, induced me to trouble you 
with my case. It is scarcely necessary to specify 
the kinds of plants affected, as, more or less, it 
affects all; but, perhaps, it is as well to mention a 
few. Balsams, Capsicums, Cockscombs, and some 
others, not only have the rotten roots, but the 
frizzled leaves ; the Fig, which used to produce two or 
three crops of good fruit in the year, barely exists, 
producing one crop only of fruit no larger than a 
pigeon’s egg; Melons will not ripen their fruit; 
Dracaenas have repeatedly had every particle of soil 
washed from their roots, the dead parts cut away, and 
been re-potted in fresh soil, but before the new roots 
have filled the pot they begin to decay ; Primulas, 
Calceolarias, Hyacinths, &c., are not now attempted, 
as they have failed so many years in succession; 
Camellias, Roses, Pelargoniums, Fuchsias, Solanums, 
Heliotropes, Chrysanthemums, Ferns, Selaginellas, and 
Cactus are amongst the worst affected ; as also are 
Orchids of the easiest growth, such as Cattleya Mossise, 
Oncidium flexuosum, Dendrobium nobile, and Cypri- 
pedium insigne. Dendrobium nobile now will not 
grow at all; but there is one peculiarity of the disease— 
that it scarcely ever kills a plant outright. 
“I introduced to public notice, in 1885, the sulphide 
of potassium as a remedy for fungoid disease. It is 
unquestionably fatal to most forms of fungus, but I 
have been disappointed as to the effects on the disease 
with which my plants have been affected so long. 
Although the application was made by plunging the 
plants, soil and all, in a strong solution, and such 
treatment benefits a healthy plant, it does not arrest 
the disease of those which are affected. This leads me 
to think that the cause may be a low form of animal 
life. There is some reason for believing that this 
disease—which appears to have been unknown not long 
ago, and even now is not specifically noticed in horti¬ 
cultural publications—is extending. The Fuchsias and 
other plants at the Chiswick Gardens of the Royal 
Horticultural Society were certainly affected by it two 
years ago, and other cases have come under my notice 
I think it possible that it, and not the mite, is the 
cause of the Eucharis disease, of which so much has 
been written of late, the mite only feeding on the 
decayed tissue. The gardener is apt to be hasty in his 
conclusion, and in the case in question, if he finds 
rotten roots and a sodden condition of soil, he attributes 
the former to the latter, whereas the latter may be the 
consequence of the former.” 
-- 
ACALYPHAS AS DECORATIVE 
PLANTS. 
Where any class of decorative plants are used, 
either for rooms or for display in plant-houses, it is 
generally acknowledged that a certain amount of 
colouration must be had for making an effective display 
suitable to bring out the other tints of green foliage by 
which it is surrounded or intermixed. 
For easy culture, and for making a rich display of 
colour during the winter months in plant-stoves, the 
Acalyphas will hold their own against many com¬ 
petitors which may be deemed more valuable as exhi¬ 
bition plants, &c. Being soft-wooded subjects, they 
root readily from cuttings at any time of the year in a 
good sharp bottom-heat, and only require potting on 
quickly to convert them into good plants fit for orna¬ 
mental purposes. They are always useful, even from 
the cutting-pot up to large bushy plants 3 ft. high 
and upwards, and proportionately bushy. A. musaica 
makes a very high-coloured specimen, and young 
plants of it in small pots make remarkably pretty 
subjects for a front line on a stove-stage at any time of 
the year. The high colour to which this variety may 
be brought by plenty of heat and light is really 
astonishing, the leaves of this sort being firmer in 
texture than those of A. macrophylla and A. marginata ; 
but the two latter exhibit some splendid tints when 
well treated. A saDdy loam, with a little leaf-soil, suits 
the requirements of their root-action, and when the 
plants become pot-bound, which they very soon do, 
a dose of weak guano-water once or twice a-week helps 
them to maintain their foliage of a good colour and 
firm in texture. 
On a recent visit to Broughton Hall, Skipton, 
Yorkshire, the residence of Sir C. Tempest, Bart., I 
saw some very fine specimens in the stove there, their 
bright crimson markings showing up very fine ; in fact, 
eclipsing all other plants for colour in the stove at the 
time of my visit. The newly appointed gardener there, 
Mr. John Rainbow, evidently has an eye to the plants 
most needed for decorative purposes, both table and 
otherwise, and is laying himself out for establishing a 
stock of young highly coloured plants, such as Crotons, 
Acalyphas, Dracfenas, &c., that will prove of great 
service to him during winter and spring time for the 
decoration of tables in dining rooms, or making bright 
his plant houses at the same time. 
At some future date I will give the readers of The 
Gardening World a full description of Broughton 
Hall, which stands in the most salubrious part of the 
noted Craven Valley. — W. ff. 
-~>X<«- 
TUBEROUS-ROOTED BEGONIAS 
AS EXHIBITION PLANTS. 
In visiting, this season, some of the provincial 
exhibitions, I have been struck with the fact that the 
tuberous-rooted Begonias are becoming very popular as 
exhibitiou plants, and they furnish highly attractive 
features at flower shows. It can also be noticed that 
good varieties are being grown for the purpose in some 
instances ; while in others poor forms are placed on the 
exhibition table—small-flowered varieties, that are of 
little value as show specimens. Those who exhibit 
should secure good varieties, both double and single, 
and grow them as finely as possible, when they will 
stand a chance of making their mark as exhibitors ; 
for I find that judges of large experience attach as 
much value to quality of flower in the Begonia as they 
do to any other class of plants. 
In order that your readers who may be fanciers of 
the tuberous-rooted Begonias should be in possession of 
lists of fine varieties, I herewith give a selection of 
those I saw in Mr. Henry Cannell’s splendid collection 
at Swanley, and I commence with the double forms. 
They are Louis d'Or, yellow; Leon de Saint Jean, 
scarlet-red, extra fine ; M. Paul de Yicq, bright 
carmine-cerise ; Susanna Hachette, rosy pink, an 
admirable exhibition variety ; Felix Crousse, orange- 
scarlet, extra fine; Fran 5 ois Buchner, clear reddish 
cerise ; M. Duvivier, rosy crimson ; Antoinette Guerin, 
pure white, with cream centre ; Blanche Duval, creamy 
white, the guard-petals tinged with deep blush ; 
Madame Yincenot, French white, the centre tinged 
with yellow; Octavie, pure white, finely formed; 
Virginalis, pure white, sulphur centre ; Agnes Sorel, 
light salmon-pink ; Grand Yille, silvery blush, centre 
pinkish salmon ; Madame Castaignez, glowing rosy 
pink, extra fine ; Madame Arnoult, deep blush, extra 
fine ; Anna Countess of Kingston, salmon, yellow 
centre ; Jean Soupert, deep salmon, fine ; Jules Leguin, 
bright salmon-red ; Marie Crousse, blush-salmon, extra 
fine ; Madame E. Galle, pale salmon, with orange 
centre; Madame Crousse, nankeen-salmon, very dis¬ 
tinct ; il. Truffaut, bright reddish salmon shaded with 
orange ; M. Bealby, clear salmon ; Gabrielle Le Gros, 
clear sulphur-white changing to soft yellow; and 
Madame E. Pynaert, creamy yellow tinted with buff. 
Of fine single varieties there are numbers. I content 
myself with naming a few of the newer ones in the 
Swanley collection, and they are as follows :—Atehalus, 
intense red, large, and very fine ; Charles Fellowes, 
crimson, suffused with red and orange; Cannell's 
Favourite, velvety scarlet, with a yellow centre, distinct 
and fine ; Gigantea, rich fiery crimson, very large and 
stout ; J. Downs, pure yellow, large and striking ; 
Lady Kirk, soft salmon, with deeper shading; 
Leviathan, deep pink ; Mr. H. G. M. Stuart, scarlet, 
with white centre ; Mrs. H. G. M. Stuart, deep rose, 
extra fine ; Mr. Aptliorpe, light magenta, a very fine 
exhibition variety ; Perfection, vivid scarlet-crimson, 
with white centre, extra fine ; Purple Gem, deep rose, 
suffused with purple ; Pink Perfection, bright pink ; 
Queen of Roses, clear rose, a very fine variety ; Queen 
of Yellows, deep pure yellow ; Salmon Queen, salmon; 
T. Baines, fiery orange, distinct, and very fine ; Yiolet 
Gem, clear bright violet ; and "W". E. Gumbleton, 
bright magenta rose, extra fine. 
I cannot too earnestly impress upon those who grow 
Begonias for exhibition purposes that judges make 
quality a leading test in making their awards. There¬ 
fore, it is that I say secure good varieties—namely, 
those with large, bold, and striking flowers. I have 
known some exhibitors trust to seedlings only to find 
themselves greatly disappointed when they flower. 
Begonias that have bloomed for the first time the 
previous summer, if the tubers are healthy, and of 
good size, make fine exhibition plants the following 
year. It is best to winter them in their pots, and 
place them in a dry cellar, or on the floor of a room, 
covered with dry cocoa-fibre—anywhere in fact where 
they can be kept dry and free from frost. Damp and 
cold are both injurious at that season of the year. As 
soon as they begin to start into bloom in spring, let 
them be re-potted in pots just large enough, and as 
they make headway, shift on into other sizes, keeping 
the plants as vigorous, and at the same time, as sturdy 
and short-jointed as possible.,—it. JD. 
-►>*<-- 
PASSIFLORA PRINOEPS. 
"Where large roomy stoves exist, and require good 
useful plants to run over the rafters or roof—something 
that may prove serviceable, both to satisfy the eye, 
and also be handy for cutting from as well—nothing 
scarcely can excel this good old-fashioned scarlet- 
racemed Passion Flower, for when well cared for, it is 
possible to cut flowers from it at almost any period of 
the year. Its usefulness is most apparent during the 
autumn and winter months when flowers are scarce, its 
bright glowing blossoms being a brilliant relief amongst 
others of a more sombre hue. For epergnes it is specially 
valuable, as it can be twisted round the column of a 
tall stand, or allowed to hang in any position from the 
top part of an epergne. 
Its cultivation in a stove may be confined to the 
rafters, or it may be allowed to cover a great part of 
the roof ; but if the latter method be adopted, the plant 
should be placed in a good well-drained bed inside the 
stove specially prepared for it, where it will flourish 
for years, and yield flowers in abundance. When 
confined to the rafters it may be grown in a pot, and 
be allowed to root through the bottom into the rubble 
or bed upon which the pot stands. Treated thus, an 
occasional good dose of liquid manure on the rubble 
round about the pot will greatly benefit the plant, and 
keep it in good health and vigour for a considerable 
time. 
Judicious pruning and thinning out of the shoots is 
always necessary in the spring months, or else the 
plant would eventually become weak. This matter 
will have to be left to the grower to exercise his own 
judgment upon. 
This special variety of Passion Flower is not easy to 
root from cuttings. The best mode of increasing this 
