April 21, 1888. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
531 
WEBBS’ 
POST FREE. I BOXES OF 
Floral Gems. 
Containing 1 liberal assortments of popular 
Flower Seeds suitable for the Gardens of 
Ladies and Amateurs. 
WEBBS’ 
D V Containing 13 varieties 1] 
QUA of Flower Seeds. Z 
/6 
WEBBS’ 
DAY Containing 24 varieties Ej! / 
DUA of Flower Seeds. / 
WEBBS’ 
Containing 36 varieties f 
DUA of Flower Seeds. g 
/ 6 
WEBBS’ 
BftV Containing 55 varieties 11 
DUA of Flower Seeds. | 1 
3/6 
WEBBS’ 
PfJY Containing 72 varieties 1 
DUA of Flower Seeds. E 
5/- 
111 E U? U Q 3 DAY Containing 95 varieties tfj 1 /_ 
(YE.DDO DUA of Flower Seeds. Zl/ 
THE QUEEN’S SEEDSMEN, 
WORDSLEY, STOURBRIDGE. 
IVY-LEAVED PELARGONIUMS. 
These are becoming great favourites. 12 new and grand vars., 
5s. 6ci. ; 6 vars., 3s.; older vavs., 2s. and 3s. per doz. Cuttings 
half price. Post free. 
BALSAMS. —The finest strain in cultivation, as double as 
Camellias, 6 d. and Is. per packet. 
“THE CLUSTER” CUCU M BER. -14 seeds, Is., post 
free. 
Write for List of BEST CHRYSANTHEMUMS, ZONAL 
PELARGONIUMS, <6c. 
GODFREY, 
Florist, EXMOUTH, DEVON, 
DAHLIA 
CATALOGUE 
FOR 1888 
IS NOW READY, 
And will be found a very useful guide for DAHLIAS, 
CARNATIONS, PICOTEES, and many other families 
of useful plants adapted for present planting. 
My collections of Dahlias are complete with every variety 
worth cultivating, embracing all the best of the 
CACTUS or Decorative Varieties, 
POMPONS, SHOW, FANCY, BEDDING, 
and SINGLES, 
Also many Novelties offered for tlie first time, 
All of which are great improvements upon existing varieties, and 
are quite as meritorious as the novelties previously sent out, 
which have made my nurseries so celebrated. 
CARNATIONS & PICOTEES 
I need not say much about these favourite flowers. My 
collection is probably the LARGEST IN EXISTENCE, and 
the quantity grown every year is simply enormous. 
All other popular families, such as 
CAILLARDIAS, HOLLYHOCKS, NEW GANNAS, 
PHLOX, PENTSTEMONS, PYRETHRUM, PINKS, 
jAnd many other important families will be found in this 
Catalogue, and can be had free on application to 
Thos.s.ware, 
HALS FABM NURSERIES, 
TOTTENHAM, LONDON 
CARTERS’ 
IWYICTA 
LAWN SEEDS 
SHould now be Sown. 
Bushel. lb. 
For VELVET LAWNS - - 25/- 1/3. 
For TENNIS LAWNS - - 2©/- I/O. 
For CRICKET GROUNDS - 2©/- I/O. 
For MENDING OLD LAWNS- 25/- 1/3. 
_All Parcels Carriage Free,_ 
Royal Seedsmen by Sealed Warrants. 
237 & 238, HIGH HOLBORM, LONDON- 
PARIS UNIVERSAL EXHIBITION, 1889. 
BRITISH SECTION. 
President, The Eight Hon. P. De Keysek, Lord Mayor. Vice- 
President, The Lord Brassev, K.C.B. 
T he EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE are 
prepared to receive applications from Builders of Hot¬ 
houses to erect Hothouses or Conservatories for use of Flower 
Shows, &c. 
Further information can be obtained on application to the 
SECRETARIES, 2, Walbrook (Mansion House), E.C, _ 
National Chrysanthemum Society. 
SCHEDULES OF LONDON AND PKO- 
IO YINCIAL SHOWS now ready, and may be had (free) on 
application to 
WILLIAM HOLMES. 
Frampton Park Nurseries, Hackney, London. 
Crystal Palace. 
BEAT SUMMEE EXHIBITION OF 
FLOWERS and PLANTS, Saturday, May 12th. Entries 
close on May 5th. Schedule of Prizes on application to Mr. 
W. G. HEAD, Superintendent of Gardens, Crystal Palace. S.E. 
r > OYAL BOTANICAL and HOETICUL- 
i TURAL SOCIETY of MANCHESTER. 
The NEXT FLORAL EXHIBITION will be held in the Town 
Hall, Manchester, TUESDAY, May 1st. 
The GRAND NATIONAL HORTICULTURAL EXHIBITION 
of 1SSS (ONE THOUSAND POUNDS in PRIZES) will open on 
MAY 18th. For Schedules apply to the undersigned, 
BRUCE FINLAY, Royal Botanic Gardens, Manchester. 
Next Week’s Engagements. 
Monday, April 23rd.—Special Sale of Cattleya Lawrenciana and 
other Imported Orchids at Protheroe & Morris’s Rooms. 
Tuesday, April 24tli.—Royal Horticultural Society: Meeting of 
Fruit and Floral Committees at 11 a.m. National Auricula 
Society’s Show, in the Drill Hall, James Street, Westminster. 
Special Sale of Orchids in Flower at Protheroe & Morris’s 
Rooms. Sale of Carnations, Pieotees, &e. atthe City Auction 
Rooms, 3S & 39, Gracechurch Street, by Protheroe & Morris 
Wednesday, April 25th.—Ancient Society of York Florists’ 
Spring Show. Sale of Cypripediums and other Orchids at 
Stevens’ Rooms. Sale of Stove and Greenhouse Plants, 
from sample, Lilies, Freesias, Cape Bulbs, &c., at Protheroe 
& Morris’s Rooms. 
Thursday, April 26th.—Royal Horticultural Society of Ireland's 
Spring Show’, in Dublin. Sale of Established and Imported 
Orchids at Stevens’ Rooms. Sale of Exhibition Plants at 
Jackson & Sons’ Kingston, by Protheroe & Morris. 
Friday, April 27th.— Sale of a portion of the collection ot 
Orchids belonging to C. Dorman, Esq., at Protheroe & 
Morris’s Rooms. 
FOR INDEX TO CONTENTS, SEE P. 542. 
“• Gardening is the purest of human pleasures, and the greatest 
refreshment to the spirit of man.”— Bacon. 
SATURDAY, APRIL 21, 1888. 
About the Potato. —Remembering the re¬ 
markable activity which prevailed in the seed 
Potato trade a few years since, we find it 
hard to account for the comparative—indeed, 
we may say, exceeding — dulness which 
prevails in the same trade now. There are 
still as many Potatos grown now as then— 
still as much land, and, possibly, very much 
more, under Potato cultivation; and there is 
far more health in the crops and safety in 
the cultivation of them than was the case 
but a few years ago. Still, dulness in 
the seed Potato trade is reported; indeed, 
there seems to he almost a plethora of seed 
tubers in the market. Very probably one 
reason of this comparative dulness is to be 
found hi that very healtlifuhiess of the 
Potato crops, which has been such a marked 
feature of the past three or four years. 
With abundant stocks, of course, comes 
cheapness and slackness of trade. So many 
tubers are of seed size that there is nothing 
better to he done with them than to reserve 
them for seed purposes again, and just what 
has been the case with large growers has 
been the case with small ones, so that there 
has been little need to obtain fresh stocks. 
Potatos as seed stocks differ so much from 
all ordinary seeds, because with most other 
crops the products are consumed entirely 
prior to ripening. In the case of Potatos, 
no stock, however fine, failed to give some 
proportions of tubers which were only fitted 
for seed, and thus whilst few were able to 
save seeds of other things, all universally do 
save some seed Potatos. Then, again, 
having had such good healthful seasons, 
alarm for the disease has been abated, and 
growers have been content to continue to 
grow the old sorts, which through the past 
few years have done them such good service. 
When disease prevails, and loss follows upon 
it, there is some energy exercised to discover 
new varieties which may possess some 
alleviating or resisting powers. With the 
disappearance of the disease goes farther 
anxiety on that hand. Whilst we have to 
admit—and that, too, with satisfaction— 
that the old Potato enemy, the Peronospora 
or fungus, seems to he fast dying out, yet 
that apparent decadence may be hut illusive, 
and a cold wet summer may bring it hack 
again in all its old virulent forms. Earnestly 
we hope that such will not be tlie case, and, 
farther, do really believe that the apparent 
decadence of the disease is not only apparent 
hut real. Assuming that it is real, there 
still remains a moot point as to how far 
seasons, on the one hand, or the introduction 
of newer and more robust or disease-resisting 
sorts of Potatos, on the other, have served 
to check the Peronospora. 
Possibly a joint cause has produced the 
beneficial effect. It is curious, however, hut 
still apparently a fact, that with the increased— 
indeed, almost assured—safety to our Potato 
crops there has come less activity in the 
seed Potato trade than was evidenced several 
years since, when the disease was rampant, 
and there was every reason for timidity in 
planting. But specially does there seem to 
have been a falling off in the interest shown 
in the introduction of new varieties. Some 
pessimists will, perhaps, say, “And a very 
good thing too ”; but we are far from 
holding those views. The same thing was, 
perhaps, said twenty years ago, hut there are, 
with the exception of the old Ash-leaf 
Kidney, very few varieties of Potatos in 
cultivation now which were ' popular then; 
and we have the fullest right to infer that 
the newer sorts have proved to he superior 
to the old ones. We may go very much 
farther, indeed, and declare that hut for the 
introduction of many fine and robust kinds 
during the past twenty years our Potato 
stocks might have been utterly decimated ; 
and then, good as may be our existing best 
kinds—and they may seem unbeatable still— 
we have little knowledge of what good things 
may lie hidden away in the bosom of nature, 
from out of which only the hand of the 
experienced raiser can pluck them. No man 
who purchased new sorts of Potatos with 
any degree of judgment ever lost by his 
outlay, for the simple reason that any kind 
of Potato will give a profitable return in 
some form or other; whilst poor and bloodless 
must be the man who does not find ex¬ 
ceeding interest in the watching of the 
gradual growth and maturation of what are 
to him, so far, novelties. Why, as exhibition 
subjects, Potatos have over and over again 
yielded the greatest possible profit! No 
vegetable is so largely exhibited ; few are, as 
exhibits, more attractive; and, in watching 
'their growth and later attention, few give 
more pleasure. 
