June 13, 1891. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
658 
have sung gracefully of it perhaps little know with 
what feelings of desperate anxiety the “ tented field” 
is changed to the array of 
summer spears, 
That soon shall wear the garland. 
It is a serious—in fact, to any but the largest capitalists, 
quite a gambling venture ; and the amount which 
continues to be staked on it would certainly not 
impress the casual visitor with any idea of the “ deca¬ 
dence of agriculture,” of which we hear so much. At 
this time of theyear whole fields—scores, if not hundreds 
of acres—maybe seen on which every individual hop-pole 
is elaborately stayed up with a separate rope like the 
mast of a ship, a connecting line of wire running round 
the whole field, which, viewed from the railway as we 
pass, looks like nothing but a gigantic spider’s web. 
And then the washing process. It sometimes seems as 
if every single leaf of the precious plant were washed ; 
and indeed this is nearly the case in times of great 
danger, when the disease, starting at one end of a line, 
may within twenty-four hours have reached the other, 
unless swept off betimes by the squirt of sulphureted 
fluid or whatever other remedy the farmer may believe 
in ; for on these there is much controversy. One way 
and another, £40, £50—nay, even £60 in the case of 
the most valuable class of Hop—is spent per acre. 
This, very possibly, goes on for two or three years. 
With the fourth, perhaps, comes a really good season 
when a sum of £15,000 to £20,000 and £25,000 may 
be cleared off less than a hundred acres. On the other 
hand, it may not (the odds are perhaps five to one 
against it); and in that case the farmer (or the gambler, 
as you please) is struck with the disagreeable nature of 
rent as an institution, and naturally appeals to that 
exhaustless resource of all sufferers—the landlord. The 
worst is that even a good season—if too generally 
good—may be almost as ruinous as a bad one. What 
would Teally suit the Hop-grower’s book—we hardly 
like to suggest such a step—would be to charter a local 
blizzard or October gale to operate on his neighbours. 
But then probably they would complain. 
Yes, there is high-farming about here, and not 
exactly low standards of comfort among the farming 
class. You see that wire by the roadside. Ho, it is 
not the telegraph. It is, an’t please you, a telephone 
connecting one of the farms of a substantial tenant 
with another. You did not think things were so 
advanced in the sleepy south ? It is almost dark now ; 
but if it were bright daylight, the country is not yet— 
bar the blossoms, which promise a splendid fruit 
season—in its beauty. A month or two hence will be 
the time for that. Then, too, the splendid timber 
that overshadows us now will have filled out to its full 
rich and rounded proportions. Ah ! such timber is 
only to be seen in England. As we turn up the 
dusky avenue, swarms of nightingales to left and right 
—loudly heard above the beat of the mare’s home¬ 
going feet and the grinding of wheels on the gravel, 
and undisturbed by either—are swishling and whiffling 
and guggling, like the noise of a thousand water-pipes. 
It is a lovely night.— St. James' Gazette. 
-— >X< -- 
POLEMONIUM RICHARDSON! 
There are some eight or nine known species of Pole- 
monium, and that under notice is closely allied to our 
British species, but as a rule is dwarfer, with larger 
flowers. The stems also differ in being downy, 
whereas both leaves and stems of P. cceruleum are 
glabrous. The name accepted by botanists is P. 
hurnile, and there is a synonym in P. villosum, but it 
will be many years probably before gardeners recognise 
any other than P. Pdchardsoni. The species was 
first discovered in 1826 by Hr. Richardson, an Arctic 
explorer, who found it near the Great Bear Lake. 
The Rocky Mountains of North America are really its 
native home, and it has proved quite hardy in Britain, 
where it llowers during May, June and July. A 
succession is kept up by the development of late 
shoots, which flower in their turn. So floriferous has 
it been during the past month, notwithstanding the 
cold and ungenial weather, that clumps of it in 
different gardens around London have been quife a 
conspicuous feature amongst other hardy subjects. 
One can imagine with what surprise Dr. Richardson 
first beheld it when we consider the effect a good 
patch of it has, even when viewed from a distance. 
Beautiful plants in their native wilds always excite 
greater enthusiasm than when seen under cultivation. 
The large flowers are of a bright sky-blue, sometimes 
tinted with purple. The accompanying illustration 
will give an idea of the inflorescence and the floriferous 
character of the plant. 
POLEMOXIUir RICHARDSONI. 
exhibitor at the exhibition of the Midland Counties 
Pansy Society in Birmingham, on the 24th inst., and 
others from the South and West also, so that we may 
have an opportunity of seeing the varieties raised and 
esteemed in those districts. Hitherto, the south and 
west of England seedlings have not found their way into 
the Midlands, and if what they are represented to be, 
would find a great sale, for Pansy growers in the 
Midlands and north of England districts may be 
numbered by hundreds. Up to now, the Scotch 
varieties have been “all the go,” and unless the 
southerns buckle on their armour, and come to our 
Pansy tournament, I fancy that the orders will still 
go to Scotland, and we shall have to settle down to the 
belief that Scotia s Pansies—to use a somewhat slangy 
phrase— 11 takes the cake.” We should greatly like to 
see flowers from all parts of the country, and to 
growers in all districts, T say come—come and see 
what I venture to predict will be far and away 
the largest exhibition of Pansies ever seen this side 
of the Tweed, for growers from Scotland and other 
The next moment long masses of rich Cherry-blossom 
gleam ghostly white at us through the half-darkness ; 
another, and our view to the left is completely shut 
out by a vegetable phenomenon which is the pride and 
wonder of the country-side—a quickset hedge, to wit, 
25 ft. high ! No flimsy or unsubstantial growth 
either, at that, is this wonderful rampart, which looks 
like a relic of some giant’s garden proportioned to the 
beanstalk of nursery fame ; but ^highly valued as a 
protection to the tender and precious Hop. In many 
places, indeed, one may see planted rows of young 
Poplars—“pollarded” at about a similar height—to 
keep off, if it be possible, the brunt of an October gale. 
Wonderful, indeed, be it remarked in passing, are the 
perils and excitements of this most speculative of 
agricultural industries. Surely no “bear” or “bull” 
upon the Stock Exchange, no promoter, no member of 
the most audacious syndicate that ever rigged a maiket, 
knows such escapes, such; calamitous losses, and, it 
may be added, such golden harvests as they who cul¬ 
tivate this tender and beautiful plant. The poets who 
the woik of creating an increased interest in the Pink. 
Mr. Joseph Lakin fears he will not have a flower in 
bloom by the 24th, and about Manchester the bloom is 
very late ; but then the Northern Society’s show will 
not take place until July 18th. Surely we may 
reasonably expect that by July 1st winter will have 
come to an end, and some genial spring weather 
commence. I am afraid that summer has parted 
company with us for ever.— 11. D. 
Pansies. 
A few weeks ago, the superiority of the West of 
England Pansies was written about in your columns, 
and I should have sent the writer a schedule if I had 
known his address. I havo sent to Mr. Hooper, of 
Bath, and I hope he will enter the arena as an 
distant places, as well as a host of home growers, have 
intimated their intention to bring blooms.— JV. Dean, 
Hon. Sec., Sparkhill. 
-->$*-- 
A TURN IN THE “GARDEN.” 
The thin-curved moon is just beginning to cast faint 
shadows of the hedges and trees upon the great white 
highway as we spin along it, upon the swiftly rolling 
wheels of a light and well-horsed dogcart, through one 
of the rich and fruitful plains of Kent. It is not at all 
an unpleasant evening for a moonlight drive. The 
chilly wind that bears the influenza microbe on its 
wing has shifted to a warmer quarter, and even the 
coming night has the feel of summer about it. 
Round us at one moment stretch far and wide perfect 
praiiies of Strawberry, thirsting, so it is said, for rain. 
