July 7, 1888. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
711 
A CO-OPERATIVE FLOWER 
SHOW. 
This is one of those happy thoughts that sprang into 
vigorous life only three years ago. Not a few have 
suspected that most of our co-operative enterprises have 
had an almost too intense utilitarian ring about 
them. Probably this has been their misfortune rather 
than their fault. Originating as most of them did in 
a hand to hand, if not a life and death, conflict between 
capital and labour, they had little thought and less 
leisure for the culture of the humanities or the pursuit 
of beauty as an antidote to individual selfishness or a 
means of softening down the sterner features of mere 
utility. Just as a touch of nature makes all mankind 
kin, so does the love of beauty in house or garden lift 
us to higher livelong life and happiness. Someone has 
finely said that beauty is more useful than utility, and 
probably in the sense of purifying life, ennobling 
character, and enlarging the capacity of thought and 
feeling, it is so. Assuredly to be enabled to appreciate 
and enjoy all the beautiful sounds and sights in nature 
and in art—flowers, fruits, figures, faces, the harmonies 
of music, the s'weet songs of birds, the sight of lake, 
river and sea, paintings, sculpture, green pastures, 
fields of golden grain, mountains, vales, and finished 
gardens and landscapes, is a higher and more cultured 
phase of life than the mere buying and selling or 
getting gain. There is little fear of the majority 
of the members of co-operative societies leaving the 
latter undone, but the collar might be greatly eased, 
and the struggle for the survival of the fittest, or the 
acquisition of the most, rendered much less severe were 
beauty but linked with utility in the daily strife for 
daily bread, competency, or wealth. Neither is there 
any good reason why this should not be so, for beauty 
is plentiful as it is cheap, and easily accessible. It is 
scattered broadcast with prodigal hand over earth, sea, 
and sky. All that is needed for its appreciation and 
enjoyment are eyes to see, hands to grasp and hold 
firm, and cultured heads to assess the worth of beauty, 
and welcome its soothing ennobling influence into our 
hearts and homes. 
The chief practical difficulty in this higher education 
of the masses meets us on the threshold. In too many 
cases the struggle for bare life is so severe as to leave 
neither time, strength, nor desire for other pursuits, 
hence such object or other lessons as can be given in aid 
of culture must be given on the spot. The learners, 
however willing, have neither the time nor the means 
to convey them far in search of the many delectable 
mountains of culture and of learning which nature and 
art provide in such profusion for the more fortunate. 
But the culture of flowers, fruits, and vegetables, the 
pursuit of gardening, are pleasures and refining pursuits 
almost within reach of all. Once such pleasures are 
tasted they are seldom or never relinquished. Again 
and again such tastes and touches of nature as make 
the whole world kin have been found to have survived 
the wreck of fortune and the ruin of virtue. The tiny 
plant or flower in a cracked cup, basin, or teapot, 
watered it may be with many salt tears, and sanctified 
by the memories of a dead mother’s love, have proved 
the one ray of hope and light amid the surrounding 
darkness and misery. Dr. Guthrie’s experience in 
mission work among the slums was that he never 
feared to follow the lead of plants and flowers ; he ever 
found sufficient humanity to ensure his safety in the 
presence of their beauty and fragrance ; and if their 
powers of uplifting and Testraint are so potent, what 
shall we say of their powers of refinement and culture 1 
Hence the superlative importance of furnishing every 
home with an object lesson, a work of love in the form 
of a garden, as well as bringing the garden into the 
home in the shape of tiny greenhouses and window 
gardens. 
The gardens and gardening of Nottingham furnish 
excellent examples of the pleasures and profits—using 
both words in the widest sense—arising from the earnest 
and intelligent pursuit of horticulture by mechanics and 
artisans chiefly. In some parts of Nottingham, gardens 
are almost as thick as bees, and societies for the 
stimulation of special plants and flowers are almost as 
plentiful as the gardens. Should any member of any 
of the numerous co-operative societies who have 
affiliated themselves to hold their Great National Flower 
Show at the Crystal Palace on the 18 th of next month, 
doubt the wisdom of this course, they could hardly do 
better than go to Nottingham and see for themselves. 
Not that all has been done there that the national 
associations of co-operative societies aim at, for the 
latter attempt to mould vegetable gardens and allotments 
on principles of landscape art, so as to link grace and 
beauty with profit and utility in a sphere where they 
have hardly attempted to meet before. Besides, by 
widening the area of competition, deeper and keener 
interest is excited, and higher results are reached. 
It may be well to add that the National Co-operative 
Flower Show includes vegetables, fruit, pot-plants, 
juvenile classes, plans of allotments, designs, farm 
produce, miscellaneous, and special awards for merit—• 
a list so full that the prizes must needs bear a most 
liberal proportion to the blanks. What, indeed, with 
specials, extras, and certificates, it seems almost 
doubtful whether there will be any blanks, for the 
extra prizes in books alone fill three well-packed pages 
of the catalogue ; and there are numerous other specials 
ranging in value from two guineas to five shillings. 
But the chief good of such flower shows spring less from 
the prizes than the healthy stimulus they afford 
towards augmenting the quantity and improving the 
quality of the products of gardens and allotments. 
Those, however, who would win prizes must study 
quality before quantity. Uniformity of size and 
quality also goes a long way towards winning. For 
example — a dozen Potatos, Apples, or Onions, as like 
each other as two peas and all good alike, will win a 
first prize in a canter, whereas a dozen that might scale 
more, made up of all sorts and sizes, from coarse giants 
to starveling dwarfs, would not and could not be 
placed. The same rule holds good with flowers and 
fruits. Quality—and uniformity of quality—runs in 
and wins in all the classes. If intending exhibitors 
will bear this in mind in staging their products at the 
Crystal Palace on the 18th of August, they will greatly 
facilitate the labours of the jurors, and powerfully Help 
themselves to win premier prizes. Novices especially, 
can seldom resist the introduction of a few monsters 
into their exhibits, and these monsters prove the ill- 
placed ballast that sink their prospect of success. 
Even, all-round lots, not sensational mixtures, are the 
exhibits justly in favour with experienced and impartial 
jurors. But win or lose, no one can take part in this 
Great National Industrial Flower Show without having 
their lives made the richer and happier in consequence. 
To carry our honours humbly, to bear defeat bravely, 
is no small part in the higher discipline of life, and 
there are few schools in which such lessons are so well 
taught as in the great horticultural exhibitions that 
spread their stimulating and refining, culturing and 
ennobling influences far and wide throughout the 
country. —Agricultural Economist. 
-->35<- 
ffOTES FROM 
Scottish Horticultural Association. —The 
usual monthly meeting of this association was held on 
Tuesday night at 5, St. Andrew Square, Edinburgh, 
Mr. Robert Morrison, and afterwards Mr. Milne, 
presiding. Mr. Bell, Mortonhall, read a paper on the 
Tomato, in the course of which he spoke successively 
of the history, the botanical order, the culture, and 
the uses of this annual, cultivated at one time solely 
for ornament, but now for its fruit, which many con¬ 
sidered a great luxury. Regarding the history of the 
Tomato, he mentioned that it was a native’of South 
America, and that it was introduced into this country 
in 1596, a year before the Potato. Going on to speak 
of its culture, Mr. Bell described in detail the treat¬ 
ment under which it could be most successfully reared. 
Of the two classes of Tomatos—corrugated and smooth— 
the first, he said, were perhaps the heaviest croppers, 
and were, in consequence, more largely grown, especially 
for market ; whilst the second certainly looked better, 
and, besides selling more readily, got the preference on 
the exhibition table. He questioned whether the 
yellow varieties would ever become popular, unless it 
could bo proved, as some contended, that they were 
superior in quality to the red in flavour. In the course 
of the discussion which followed the reading of Mr. 
Bell’s paper, frequent reference was made to the 
rapidity with which the taste for Tomatos—an acquired 
taste it was admitted to be—had grown in recent years ; 
and one gentleman remarked that the Tomato, more 
than perhaps any other fruit or vegetable, furnished 
the most notable and incontestable proof of the strides 
which gardening has made in this northern part of the 
kingdom during the last thirty-five or forty years. 
Mr. Alexander Mackenzie, 'Warriston Nursery, after¬ 
wards read a paper by Mr. Hugh Gorrie, Mauldslie 
Castle, on “A few Stove Plants suitable for Table, for 
Flowering, and for other purposes.” In his com¬ 
munication Mr. Gorrie mentioned a number of w’hat he 
considered the most beautiful and useful of our stove 
plants, and described the treatment which, in his 
experience, he had found the most productive of good 
results. Some little discussion followed the reading of 
this paper also. Both authors were cordially thanked. 
Among a number of exhibits on the table was a seedling 
Strawberry, named John Buskin, for which Mr. J. 
Fraser, Annan, was awarded a First Class Certificate 
(see p. 716). 
Useful Flowers for Exposed Positions.— 
Some four years ago we had to clear a piece of waste 
land covered with all kinds of obnoxious weeds. The 
position was cold, the soil of the worst description, 
while the subsoil was wet and often flooded during the 
winter. Cut flowers being greatly in demand, we 
resolved to make an herbaceous garden, and also to get 
a display of spring flowers in this untoward position. 
Draining, trenching down the weeds three spits, and 
thoroughly manuring was the preparation for the 
plants, which were all purchased from a choice stock, 
costing a deal of money. They were arranged and 
planted, each receiving a handful or two of rich kindly 
soil at the roots. The growth of all was immense, and 
the flowering has been every season very abundant 
throughout. Among those which have done specially 
well are Spirceas, Delphiniums, Asters, Pyrethrums, 
Pjeonies, Phloxes, Tritomas (this one has taken to 
flower this year during June ; the kind is T. uvaria), 
Liliums, Dielytras, Iberis superba, and Iris in great 
variety ; while many Alpines clothe the surface of the 
soil. Digging is not attempted among the plants, but 
weeds and suckers are not allowed to appear, a good 
hoeing being often given. At the present time (end of 
June) the display of flowers is immense. A dressing of 
clean soil put over the surface defies drought, and such 
a valuable adjunct for supplying cut flowers affords the 
proprietors great pleasure, especially as the space was 
at one time considered worthless for anything except a 
rubbish heap.— Caledonian. 
Cabbage Sowing. —It is seldom that one meets 
in northern gardens with two cultivators who sow 
their Cabbage seed at the same period for supplying 
heads ready for use during spring and early summer ; 
but as circumstances change the character of crops most 
seasons, we prefer sowing at least three times, and 
have, of course, as many successions. Kinds of 
Cabbages coming in weeks after each other removes, in 
a great measure, the difficulty ; but in some seasons— 
the present one in particular—they go to seed, and 
are almost worthless before they can be used. Some 
sorts have stood much better than others, McEwan’s 
especially. Those sown before the middle of July have 
done the worst, and we think a good selection of sorts, 
made and sown at the time indicated, is likely to 
be attended with greatest success. The small ones are 
pricked out on a border, and lifted for planting in early 
spring. The preparation of the ground is viewed from 
opposite aspects by many ; but the quality, texture, 
and position of the land must be duly considered. ¥e 
know what it is to have all we desired from planting 
the Cabbage crop on ground after Onions were cleared 
off, using a pointed iron rod to make holes ; but we 
have charge of land at present on which it would be an 
act of folly to plant in that fashion, yet we can have 
excellent produce by trenching deeply and manuring 
heavily for Cabbages. — Caledonian. 
Flowering Shrubs. —"We do not remember ever 
seeing shrubs (young and vigorous) flowering so freely 
as at the present time — which may be from their 
making an excellent growth last year—and becoming 
well ripened at an early period of autumn, having a 
long rest afterwards. The ripening and rest, of course, 
is what one desires most when flowers or fruit on any 
tree are wanted ; but if the trees have suffered by 
drought during the previous year, they become so 
debilitated that they cannot “ bear their own burdens ” 
—support fruits or flowers. We had no water or time 
to help these shrubs, and many of them are on ground 
almost entirely composed of gravel, others on clay land 
of the heaviest nature ; all were well mulched at 
planting time with bog earth and well-rotted manure, and 
the roots have grown up into this and are very healthy. 
Standard Thorns (red, pink and white), Laburnums, and 
others towering above dwarf shrubs, kept at 3 ft. to 
5 ft. high, give relief and a striking effect. Rhododen¬ 
drons (in great variety), golden and white Brooms, 
Cotoneasters, and many others make the undergrowth 
gay ; a mixture of foliage plants, such as Retinospora, 
golden Yews, Aucubas, golden Spiraeas, golden Elders, 
round-leaved Laurels (a splendid hardy shrub), Por¬ 
tugal Laurels, Cupressus (of sorts), &c., belted with 
Berberis and St. John’s Wort, make a most pleasing 
picture. — Caledonian. 
GOTLAND. 
