October 18, 1890. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
101 
very misleading. Next year, probably, we may be 
able to furnish an exhibition of profitably produced 
Apples, and until we can do so the less we crow over our 
Apple production the better.— A. Dean. 
-- 
THE BIRMINGHAM GARDENERS’ 
ASSOCIATION. 
The opening meeting of the autumn session took 
place on the evening of October 6th, when A. W. Wills, 
Esq., J.P., well known in the Midlands for his fine 
collection of Orchids, gave a most interesting lecture on 
“ Burmah, the country and the people, ” and at the close 
of the lecture, treated his audience to a view of about 
forty illustrations, by means of a powerful magic- 
lantern, from photos taken by himself during a travel 
through India (especially the Ceylon district), and 
Burmah, and a two months’ residence at Mandalay. In 
the course of a most entertaining and instructive two 
hours lecture, Mr. Wills spoke of extraordinary 
masses of Bougainvillea growing wild, and in colour 
much deeper and brighter' than seen under stove 
cultivation ; Selaginellas 3 ft. high, gigantic masses of 
Bamboos 40 ft. to 50 ft. high, masses of Gleichenia 
dichotoma growing in the rocks 5,000 ft. above the 
sea, Poinsettia puleherrima, 10 ft. high ; Gardenias, 
Euphorbia jacquime flora in large masses and abundance, 
Amherstia nobilis, a native plant with heads of flowers 
4 ft. long, and tens of thousands of Orchids. In one 
amateur’s garden were fully fifty varieties of Crotons, 
immense tubs of Eucharis, Vanda ccerulea and V. teres, 
Dendrobiums, Ipomcea quamoclit, and many other 
plants thriving out of doors, Vanda teres growing 
about like Ivy. Immense Platyceriums were growing 
on trunks of trees ; while an expanse of scrub, as far as 
the eye could reach, could be seen, with a brilliant mass 
of Cactus in bloom, a magnificent Fan Palm 90 ft. high, 
and Tree Ferns 70 ft. high, one especially measured 
having fronds 20 ft. in length. Huge masses of the 
Golden Gymnogrammas were seen, and the soil was so 
fertile that three crops of rice were obtained in one 
season. It was a lecture long to be remembered. 
It was also an exhibition meeting, and Messrs. Pope 
& Son sent a beautifully set up lot of new single 
Dahlias, and the lovely white Pompon, George 
Brinkman. Messrs. Thomson sent a good collection 
of Michaelmas Daisies, and other flowers ; Messrs. 
Hewitt & Co., new Michaelmas Daisies, and a fine lot 
of seedling Tuberous Begonias and choice herbaceous 
plants, including Colehicum speciosum, Agrostemma 
coronaria alba, and Delphinium chinensis alba. Mr. 
Cooper, The Gardens, Highbury, contributed a fine 
collection of Liliums and other out-door hardy flowers. 
Mr. Burbury, Orchid grower at Highbury, sent well- 
bloomed plants of Cattleya aurea, very fine, C. 
maxima, and Dendrobium fimbriatum giganteum. 
There was a large attendance, Sir Thomas Martineau, 
president of the society, presiding. 
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FLOWER SHOWS. 
Some day, perhaps, the pen of a well-informed writer 
will give us the history of flower shows. They had a 
beginning somewhere—but when ? It is believed that 
to the present century is due the honour, and we may 
add, the pleasure of flower exhibitions on the formal 
scale of the present day. It was about 1827, thirteen 
years after the Royal Horticultural Society of our day 
had been formed as the London Horticultural Society, 
that a flower show took place. I have not the slightest 
doubt but that florists’ flower shows in a small way, and 
of a rudimentary character, had taken place years 
before, and that in rooms of public houses there had 
been held for years little competitive exhibitions of 
Tulips, Auriculas, Gooseberries, &c., full of interest to 
those who took part in them. But there was no 
horticultural press in those days to chronicle these 
events, and therefore little or no record of them has 
been handed down to us. Sixty or seventy years ago 
a few flowers, comparatively, were grown. But there 
is no doubt some of these were cultivated for their 
beauty, aud with some success and much enthusiasm, 
for something like 300 years—for nearly three 
centuries. 
Gardens indeed there were in Babylon, in Greece, 
and in Rome ; as well as in Persia, Turkey, Italy, 
Holland, and France ; but in most of these countries, 
gardening as an improving art made but little progress, 
until what is called landscape gardening came into 
favour in England. The English gardens, three 
centuries since, were little better than physic plots, 
where “images cut in Juniper” abounded, and where 
the most noticeable fruits and flowers of May and 
June, according to Lord Bacon, consisted of “ Pinks of 
all sorts, especially the blush Pink ; Roses of all kinds, 
except the musk, which comes later ; Honeysuckles, 
Strawberries, Bugloss, Columbine, the French Mari¬ 
gold, Flos africanus, Cherry tree in fruit, Ribes, which 
no doubt refers to Ribes ruberrima, the common English 
Currant ; Figs in fruit, Rasps, Vine Flowers, Lavender 
in flower, the Sweet Satyrium with the white flower, 
a name applied to several species of Orchis from their 
supposed aphrodisiac character ; the Apple tree in 
blossom, &c., which were all planted and kept in 
‘order’ after the Italian, French or Dutch system, but 
which can scarcely be considered as having been 
cultivated.” 
The story of the Tulip mania is well known, and it 
is not necessary to repeat it in detail. It is noted by 
Bacon as coming in with the “fair maids of February.’ 
Even at this early period, the scentless flower with which 
the stolid Dutch so insanely gambled, had found its 
way into England, and had really begun to be cultivated 
throughout Europe. Curses, as all epidemic manias are 
to the generation immediately suffering, they often,when 
passed, leave behind them permanent good. Madness 
for irresponsible empire sent Alva to the Netherlands ; 
a mania for Tulips took Dutch and Flemish merchants 
to the Levant. The persecution of the first drove over 
to England, more especially to London and Norwich, 
the Flemish weavers ; the enterprise of the second 
furnished them with a flower which, though not a 
native, reminded them of their fatherland, as they 
watched its gay cups open in the little parterres they 
cultivated after the loom was stilled. To these poor 
exiles of conscience, Tulips, Hyacinths, Carnations, and 
Auriculas spoke of home, and bound them to it as year 
after year sales of so-called Dutch bulbs took place. Then 
interchange and rivalry kept up the feeling until the 
demon of bricks and mortar strode over the poor London 
weaver’s rood of earth; superior cultivation, greater 
varieties of flowers, and better prepared exhibitions, 
coupled with a depressed silk manufacture and a 
poverty-stricken home, left him with but the historic 
renown of having been one of the earliest western culti¬ 
vators of flowers, and one of the first formal exhibitors 
of them. 
So far as can be discovered, Norwich seems to have 
been the earliest town famous for its flower shows ; 
close on its heels coming London, followed by Lanca¬ 
shire, the midlands, the north generally and the low¬ 
lands of Scotland. These poor men’s exhibitions, there 
is reason to believe, continued through the time of the 
Commonwealth, outlived the Dutch gardening, and 
have never been entirely extinguished, except perhaps 
in London, where railroads, exigencies of trade, poverty 
and other causes took or drove them out of the sphere 
of the artizans and weavers, and in course of time in 
other hands have made floral arrangements a work of 
art. 
There are florists’ societies in Lancashire, Cheshire, 
Yorkshire and other counties that date back for over a 
century. They exist still and do good work in their 
way. During the last thirty years the flower show has 
become quite a social institution, and they abound in 
many parts of the country ; on the whole they have 
exerted and still exert a beneficial and elevating 
tendency. Men and women are brought by them to 
see some of the fairest forms of beauty in nature, and 
are drawn to them, and in course of time become 
cultivators of flowers, and so the succession goes on. 
It is the existence of floral competitions which has 
largely helped to make our gardening press. 
In what directions flower shows may be improved 
and made more elevating social agencies than they are 
at present are matters for discussion ; a little debate on 
the subject would be advantageous. I trust the 
appearance of the foregoing remarks may lead to some 
correspondence in The Gardening World. — R. D. 
-- 
THE APIARY. 
The Honey Harvest in Upper Speyside. — 
Apiarians in Upper Speyside districts have this year 
suffered somewhat from the unfavourable character of 
the weather ; but in this jespect they seem to have 
been on the whole more favoured than those residents 
in some other parts of Scotland, and particularly in the 
Highlands. The occupants of many hives were 
destroyed in the early summer by the rawness of the 
atmosphere, and bee-masters generally had to resort to 
feeding till an unusually advanced period of the season. 
Some fine days were, however, enjoyed during July 
and August, while September was uniformly fine. The 
bloom of the Heather being exceptionally rich, such 
stocks as had been carefully attended to succeeded in 
storing a large quantity of very fine honey. The 
two largest bee-masters in Speyside are Mr. John 
Macdonald, Lynchat, Kingussie, and Mr. D. Grant, 
merchant, Kincraig. At the Kingussie flower show 
the first-named gentleman had on exhibition about 
1 cwt. of splendid clover and heather honey, the judges 
remarking on the excellence of the quality considering 
the generally unfavourable character of the season. 
Since then he has extracted about 1,000 lbs. of heather 
honey, the average per hive being about 40 lbs. Mr. 
Grant took from his twenty hives an average of about 
35 lbs., beautifully finished. Others in Speyside 
possessing smaller stocks have been similarly successful, 
so that the season has turned out much better than 
was at one time anticipated.— JF. K. 
-- 
THE CLEMATIS. 
Somehow or the other the Clematis, with all its great 
capacities for decoration in early and late summer, does 
not meet with that recognition I think it deserves. It 
seems to be sparingly planted, and yet the variety of 
form and colour seen in it is so great, while it can be 
employed in so many ways as a decorative agent, that 
the wonder is it is not more generally planted. I think 
one cause of failure is that it is often injudiciously 
planted ; that is to say, it is placed in an unsuitable 
position—frequently in indifferent soil, where, instead 
of flourishing, it retrogrades, and at flowering time puts 
forth a few small and weakly-coloured blossoms, and 
then it disappoints. 
I have seen Clematises planted in a bed of gravel by 
the wall of a villa residence, and it is not to be 
wondered at if the plants fail to flourish. The 
Clematis requires to be cultivated, and it generously 
answers to liberal treatment. It roots freely, and needs 
good soil to cause it to renew its energies ; and when 
planted against a villa residence, a deep bed of rich soil 
should be made, into which it can root freely. The 
plant should be well watered in dry weather, adding 
some mulching every season, and if it is possible to do 
so, administering some liquid manure occasionally. 
The strong summer-blooming types, those which 
flower on the strong shoots of the current season, can 
be pruned back hard in the autumn if necessary. Those 
types which flower on the ripened wood of the previous 
year—the patens and florida types—should have the 
old decayed wood cut away merely, or the swelling 
buds may be lost, and any expected blossom also. To 
cut back the patens and florida types as one would the 
Jackmanni type, for instance, is to destroy a season’s 
bloom. 
A few thoroughly good varieties of Clematis will be 
found in the following:—Beauty of Worcester, a 
sterling novelty, producing both double and single 
flowers, of a lovely blush-violet shade ; Duchess of 
Edinburgh (florida type), large, pure white, double ; 
Edouard Defosse, light mauve-purple, continuous in 
bloom ; Jackmanni, intense violet-purple ; Jeanne 
d’Arc, greyish white ; Lanuginosa, pure lavender ; 
Lanuginosa nivea, pure white, extra fine ; Madame 
Grange, crimson-violet, red bars ; Madame van Houtte, 
white, tinted with mauve ; Miss Bateman (patens 
type), an excellent white variety ; Prince of Wales, 
deep pucy purple ; Rebecca, rich claret-purple ; Stand- 
ishii (patens type), light mauve-purple ; Stella (patens 
type), deep mauve, with a distinct deep reddish plum- 
coloured bar in the centre of each petal ; and Thomas 
Moore, pucy violet; and I cannot leave out the 
beautiful early-flowering species, C. montana, for its 
charming white flowers are produced so abundantly in 
May. If anyone would see this beautiful Indian 
climber at its best, they should pay a visit to the 
village of Sonning, near Reading, in May, where this 
species is largely grown, and they would see it in all 
its beauty, growing against many of the houses. The 
river-side inn, a house much frequented by fishermen, 
is almost entirely covered by it.— R. D. 
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HERBACEOUS PLANTS. 
In your number for October 11th, p. 93, “ W. P. R.’’ 
writes anent herbaceous plants, and says : “ I think, 
strictly speaking, an herbaceous plant is one that loses 
its stems annually, whilst the roots continue alive in 
the earth,” and he instances such plants as Alyssura 
saxatile, Iberis, Aubrietias, and Arabis not being 
eligible for spring flower show prizes, they not being 
herbaceous plants. Well then, what are they 1 I have 
had a long experience of these plants, and have never 
yet been taught that all herbaceous plants “ lose their 
stems annually” (i.e., die down completely above the 
ground, as I take “ W. P. R.” to mean). Are not 
Tradescantias, Spirtea palraata and others, Hemerocallis 
