June 22, 1889. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
071 
GREAT REDUCTION IN PRICE 
— OF — 
Standen's Manure. 
ESTABLISHED NEARLY 30 YEARS , 
8®" Terms of Subscription.— Post free from the office to any 
part of the United Kingdom, one copy, ljd.; three months, 
Is. 8 d .; six months, 3s. 3d. ; twelve months, Os. 6 d. Foreign 
Subscription to all counties in the Postal Union, 8s. 8 d. per 
annum. 
Next Week’s Engagements. 
Monday, June 24tli.—Ryde Rose Show. 
Tuesday, June 25th.—Royal Horticultural Society : Meeting of 
Fruit and Floral Committees at 11 a.m. Sale of Plants, 
Garden Utensils, &c., at Gunnersbury House, Acton, by 
Protheroe & Morris. 
Wednesday, June 20th.—Flower Show at Richmond, Surrey. 
Thursday, June 27th.—Flower Showsat Dublin and Winchester. 
Friday, June 2Sth.—Sale of Orchids at Protheroe & Morris's 
Rooms. 
Saturday, June 29th.—Reigate Rose Show. 
The reduction has been effected through the 
introduction of increased and improved plant 
for manufacturing. 
It is now generally acknowledged that this 
highly concentrated Manure exceeds all others 
in general fertilising properties and staying- 
powers, thus rendering its money value at least 
double that of any other Manure. 
It promotes a rapid, healthy, and robust 
growth to plants generally. 
It is a clean and dry powder, with very little 
smell. 
It is consequently particularly adaptable for 
Amateurs equally with Nurserymen. 
For Index to Contents & Advertisements, see p.682. 
SATURDAY, JUNE 22, 1889. 
experimentalists to test this and that form of 
treatment, and success was gradually evolved. 
Mr. Veitch paid the Royal Horticultural 
Society the equivocal compliment of suggesting 
that that body had in the past helped to 
elucidate largely the road to successful culture, 
yet showing that Dr. Lindley’s course of 
treatment was of the most conservative kind, 
and that failure constantly attended upon his 
methods. 
Really the spell in failures seems to have been 
broken by some private growers, who found 
that the old tropically treated, close, stuffy, 
ill-ventilated, and unhealthy houses were death¬ 
traps alike to plants and growers; and in 
adopting cooler treatment, giving plenty of fresh 
air and light, and a purer atmosphere, a won¬ 
derful gain was obtained, the fruits of which 
we see in the present day. No greater 
modesty could have been exhibited than in the 
omission by Mr. Veitch of all reference to 
the great work done in relation to Orchid 
culture by his own firm, a fact to which Sir 
Trevor Lawrence made graceful and fitting 
reference. It may be, as Mr. Veitch later 
showed, there are still many choice Orchids, 
the cultivation of which is imperfectly under¬ 
stood, but none the less we have brought our 
knowledge of Orchid culture to a high degree 
of perfection now. 
Sold in Tins of increased sizes, 6d., Is., 2s. 6d., 
5s. 6d., and 10s. 6d. each; and in Kegs (Free) at the 
following greatly reduced prices :—28 lbs, 10s. 6d.; 
56 lbs., 18s.; 112 lbs., 32s. each. 
SOLE MANUFACTURERS • 
CORRY, SOPER, FOWLER k Co, Ltd, 
16, FINSBURY STREET, LONDON, E.C. 
Sold by all Nurserymen, Seedsmen, and 
Florists. 
ROSES 
The finest HYBRID PER¬ 
PETUAL, TEA-SCENTED, 
and other varieties, from 
15s. to 42s. per dozen. 
IN 
POTS. 
Catalogue of New Varieties on 
application. 
DICKSONS, Nurseries CHESTER. 
(Limited.) 
FERNS A SPECIALITY. 
The finest, most varied, choice, and interesting collection in 
the Trade. 
1,400 species and varieties of Stove, Greenhouse, and Hardy 
Ferns. 
Partially descriptive Catalogue free on application. 
Illustrated Catalogue (No. 21), containing 120 illustrations, 
and much valuable information on the cultivation of Ferns, 
Is. 6 d., post tree. 
W. & J. BIRKENHEAD, 
FERN NURSERY, 
SALE, MANCHESTER. 
CUTBlfSK'S 
MILLTRACK MUSHROOM SPAWN. 
Too well known to require descrip¬ 
tion. Price 6s. per bushel ; Is. extra 
per bushel for package; or 6d. per cake , 
free by Parcel Post, Is. None genuine 
unless in sealed packages, and printed 
cultural directions enclosed, with our 
signature attached. 
Wm. CUTBUSH & SON, 
NURSERYMEN A SEED MERCHANTS, 
EIGSSe.&'PE ffTCfft SERIES, 
LONDON N. 
ROSES in POTS. 
All the best New and Old English and Foreign sorts, 
from 18s. to 36s. per dozen. 
Descriptive List free on application. 
RICHARD SMITH & Co., 
Nurserymen and Seed Merchants, 
WORCESTER. 
CURRENT TOPICS. 
H(|b. Harry A'eitch on Orchid History.— 
Lovers of Orchids, present at the West¬ 
minster Drill Hall on the lltli inst., had a 
genuine treat in hearing the admirably com¬ 
piled paper on Orchid History in this country, 
especially as relates to failures in the earlier 
methods of cultivation, read by Mr. Harry 
J. Veitch. Of those lovers of these beau¬ 
tiful flowers there were, however, but few 
present; and therefore to the many the non¬ 
publication of this excellent paper in the 
gardening press is a great loss. It was a 
fitting compliment to Mr. Veitch that Sir 
Trevor Lawrence, president of the society, 
should have presided on the occasion, and that 
a vote of thanks should have been proposed to 
him by such a devoted Orchidist as Baron 
Schroder, who has, among private growers, one 
of the finest collections in the world. 
It is to be deplored that Mr. Veitch’s paper 
should not be read by every young Orchid 
grower with even more zest and usefulness 
than by older men, and that it should be practi¬ 
cally immured in the pages of the R. H. S. 
journal, a publication which goes into the 
hands of many who care nothing for horticul¬ 
ture, whilst it is not seen by those for whose 
special benefit this Orchid paper was designed. 
Naturally the gardening press let all the 
society’s publications severely alone; and in 
publishing this journal, and thus withholding 
from the mass of the newspaper-reading com¬ 
munity the publication of excellent papers in 
the universally-read gardening press, the society 
is doing horticulture great mischief. 
To assume that any reader of an elaborately 
prepared paper is repaid by having an audience 
of some fifty or sixty persons is absurd; whilst 
to withhold the paper from publication till 
months after the interest in the matter has 
expired is a very poor compliment to the 
author. Readers of papers should make better 
bargains before placing their brains at the 
disposal of the Council. 
(IYrchid Cultivation.— Mr. Veitch, advisedly 
^ enough, rather illustrated his paper by 
describing failures in Orchid cultivation in 
the past than by displaying present triumphs. 
No doubt he was right in assuming that 
more can be learnt by knowing what to avoid 
than by what successes have been achieved. 
Certainly, for the first half-century of Orchid 
culture in this country, there seemed to have 
been but one long chapter of failures, until 
here and there it dawned upon the minds of 
T oung Orchid-Growers.— There rvas one 
point in Mr. Veitch’s paper which 
specially merits the attention of jmung gar¬ 
deners, and especially of the Orchid-growers of 
the rising generation. It is the complaint that 
the present methods of culture are often too 
much based on rule-of-thumb, and not suffi¬ 
ciently upon scientific or geographical know¬ 
ledge. The great cause of early failures iu 
Orchid culture arose from the fact that growers 
at home little understood the real nature of the 
climates from which the plants were brought, 
the diverse temperatures found in those cli¬ 
mates, and the even more diverse habits of 
growth which the various species exhibit in their 
native habitats. 
This ignorance still largely exists—in Mr. 
Veitch’s opinion—and his statement constitutes 
a grave indictment of our method of educating 
or training young Orchid-growers, for he 
holds that nearly all our present success has 
been obtained more by haphazard or rule-of- 
thumb practice than by actual scientific know¬ 
ledge. Where or how is this scientific training 
to be obtained 1 Here is a problem we should 
like to find a solution of. We may write 
disparagingly of Orchid crazes, but the fact is, 
that this truly grand and marvellously beautiful 
class of plants has obtained such a hold upon 
the European merchant, their culture is rather 
likely to extend than to be restricted ; and the 
more so as we have found out that after all 
they are far more easily and cheaply grown than 
was at first believed. They have become very 
abundant and accessible, and it is really more 
a problem as to securing accomplished culti¬ 
vators in the future, than in obtaining the 
plants themselves. Clearly this problem of 
the production of a race of scientific Orchid- 
growers presses for solution. 
'Hew and the Nomenclature Question.— 
During the conversation which followed 
upon the reading of Mr. Veitch’s paper, 
Sir Trevor Lawrence paid a not undeserved 
compliment to the Kew authorities for 
the undoubted improvement manifested in 
the general appearance of the Orchids at the 
Royal gardens; and in reference to which it 
was later remarked that Kew ought specially 
to exhibit cultivation of plants of the highest 
order, a remark which elicited from Mr. Dyer 
the reply that at Kew those who had the 
culture of the plants in their care had no 
control over the erection of the houses, which 
it is probable are built with as much regard 
to the convenient circulation of the public, as 
for the benefit of the plants they contain. 
