October 10, 1891. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
81 
wick. The other is a conical Apple, and the largest 
in the fruit room. It is more or less angled, 
especially round the eye, and is pale green, some¬ 
times having a red side and thinly dotted with russet 
on the sunny exposure. 
Pear Fondante d’Automne. 
The fruit of this variety varies greatly in size accor¬ 
ding to the age and vigour of the tree. It is top¬ 
shaped, very broad in proportion to its length, 
slightly uneven on the surface, but smooth and pale 
green, slightly mottled with russet. It has nothing 
special in the way of colour to recommend it, except 
a flush of brownish-red on the exposed side. The 
flesh is white, crisp and juicy in the early stages 
of ripening, but soon becomes melting, sweet and 
sugary, although not strongly aromatic. Some 
allowance must, however, be made for the flavour 
of Pears this year owing to the amount of rain and 
the want of sunshine so necessary for the develop¬ 
ment of high-quality fruit. The crop at Devonhurst, 
Chiswick, has been unusually heavy, for the branches, 
which were nearly upright at the beginning of the 
season, were borne down into a drooping position 
with the weight of the fruit. 
Apples for Town Gardens. 
Those who live in and close to large towns such as 
Manchester, Wolverhampton, and Birmingham are 
more anxious to grow a few fruits than those who 
live in much more favoured districts, and to such a 
knowledge of the best kinds to cultivate under un¬ 
favourable conditions is a decided gain. I have had 
many years of experience of large manufacturing 
towns, and know how frequently we find in these 
town gardens and allotments varieties which rarely 
produce fruit, just because when the cultivator has 
no knowledge of varieties, one sort must be as good 
as another in his estimation. Looking over a 
suburban garden in Birmingham the other day, I 
noticed good crops on pyramidal trees of Cellini 
Pippin, Echlinville, and Lord SufAeld, but the 
cultivator is a first-class hand at managing fruit 
trees, and keeps them closely thinned of young growth 
from June onwards, so that plenty of light and air is 
admitted, and the fruit spurs are well plumped up. 
In Messrs. Pope & Sons’ Nurseries at King’s 
Norton, a very excellent and very old variety of 
Apple, the Red Astrachan, may now be seen in its 
best character, fruit of good size and well coloured, 
and of excellent flavour, and it is a good and pretty 
certain cropper. Worcester Pearmain and Lane's 
Prince Albert also crop so well here, and the fruit 
of both kinds hang firmly on the trees, and are both 
certain croppers. Prince Albert has been grown 
here for quite twenty years, and is very much 
esteemed for its excellent quality and is such a good 
cropper. Here then are six good cottage garden 
varieties, suitable for smoky town suburban 
gardens, where fruit growing is a very different matter 
to what can be done in more bright and genial 
districts.—IK. D. 
PLANT STEMS. 
The stems of plants, although not so important as 
roots, leaves, and flowers, are nevertheless very 
necessary to vegetable organisms, as they form, as it 
were, the framework which sustains the whole 
structure of the plants, and at the same time serve as 
channels of communication between the various 
parts. So far as use to mankind is concerned", how¬ 
ever, they are second only to the seed organs which 
form so large a proportion of human food. Wood 
and the various fibres used for manufacturing pur¬ 
poses got from the stems of plants are hardly less 
necessary for life and comfort than the staff of life 
itself. 
Stems arise very early in ,the~growth of the infant 
plants, as they make their appearance immediately 
after the rootlets shoot forth from the germinating 
seeds, and, turning upwards, force their way through 
the soil towards the air and light above. All stems, 
however, do not rise above the ground, but many of 
them remain buried more or less completely in the 
earth. Thus Tubers, like Potatos and Artichokes, 
are really fleshy enlargements of underground stems. 
There are also stems which, although they reach the 
surface, do not rise perpendicularly above it, but 
spread out horizontally, and send down roots at 
various points, and in this way virtually give rise to 
new growths. A well-known example of this is 
found in the Strawberry, which sends out runners, 
and spreads in this manner. Then again in some 
cases the main stem rises straight into the air, 
but beneath the surface of the ground side branches 
grow out through the earth, and send forth roots at 
different parts, which may become the starting 
points of separate plants. Advantage of these 
peculiarities of stem growth is often taken to pro¬ 
pagate plants which exhibit them. Generally, 
however, stems rise upwards, carrying the leaves 
and flowers to the light and air so necessary for 
vegetable life. 
Underground stems are frequently mistaken for 
roots, but in reality they are quite distinct from 
these organs. One distinguishing feature of stems is 
their capacity of budding,'a capacity which roots do 
not possess. Stems, in fact, proceed from buds, and 
during growth are terminated at their growing points 
by a bud, which lengthens out something after the 
manner of a drawn-out telescope into stem, and 
leaves placed at regular intervals. 
The structure of the stems of the higher orders of 
plants is in general very complicated, but the base 
or fundamental form out of which it is all built is 
found, like that of every other part of living 
organisms, in the protoplasmic cell or drop of proto¬ 
plasm, surrounded by a wall or covering of more 
solid material. In the first place, a number of these 
cells, not differing one from the other in any special 
manner, cohere or join together to form the more or 
less cylindrical stalk. The cells on the outside of 
this elementary stem] get somewhat hardened and 
flattened to form a sort of skin or epidermis. The 
early stems and the newly-formed parts of those 
which are mature are formed of little else than these 
masses of little cells joined together, or cellular 
tissue, as it is called. In some of the lower orders 
of vegetable life—such as mushrooms and others of 
a like nature—the stems never reach beyond the 
rudimentary stage of cellular tissue, but in the 
higher orders changes in the tissue speedily make 
their appearance. Tubes or ducts are formed by the 
union of cells in long rows, and the 'absorption of 
that part of the wall or cover which [divides one 
cell in these rows from another. These] tubes form 
bundles, which are known as vascular bundles or 
tissue. Other cells become elongated, and inter¬ 
weave with one another so as to form fibrous 
material, like flax, hemp, &c. Then again cells of 
somewhat the same shape have their walls thickened 
by deposits of hard material and form wood. In 
some of the lower forms of plants the stem is formed 
somewhat simply, the vascular bundles being deve¬ 
loped at once, so that no further thickening takes 
place, but growth is confined to the summit, and 
hence they have been named summit growers. 
In the flowering plants, how r ever, a more compli¬ 
cated process is gone through, by which the stem is 
thickened and hardened as well as elongated. These 
plants have been generally divided into two great 
classes, viz., those which grow towards the centre 
and, as it were, force the circumference out¬ 
wards, and those which grow by continual additions 
to the outside. The distinction, however, is not 
very clearly defined, but it serves to mark an un¬ 
doubted difference in the mode of stem growth. In 
the inward-growing stems the vascular bundles 
appear first somewhat irregularly scattered through 
the cellular tissue, but are in greater numbers to¬ 
wards the outside or circumference. As the plant 
grows older those bundles increase towards the 
centre and gradually displace the ordinary cellular 
tissue. In some cases the stem becomes so densely 
packed with hardened bundles that further growth is 
impossible, and the plant dies ; or it may be that the 
circumference gets so hardened that expansion is 
stopped, and increase can only take place in length. 
This occurs in such woody plants as the palms. 
When one of these vascular bundles is minutely 
examined by cutting it down the middle, so that its 
various parts are exposed to inspection, it is seen to 
possess a definite arrangement of differently-shaped 
cells and fibres. On the outside there are first the 
ordinary cells, composing the cellular tissue. Next 
to them is a number of narrow elongated cells, shaped 
somewhat like a spindle, being broad at the middle 
and becoming narrow at each end. These are inter¬ 
laced so as to form a sort of stringy or fibrous tissue. 
Then there is a number of fine cylindrical cells where 
growth takes place. Succeeding these are many long 
tubes or ducts, and last of all a number of cells 
similar in shape to those which formed the 
fibrous tissue, but generally of a harder and 
firmer nature, which are known as wood fibre. 
When the vascular bundle reaches maturity 
growth ceases, and the fine cylindrical growing 
cells disappear. In plants of this class, then, the 
growth of the stem may be considered to pro¬ 
ceed in the following manner. There is formed 
first the more or less cylindrical stalks, composed 
entirely of cellular tissue surrounded by a skin or 
epidermis. In the interior there speedily develop 
bundles of fibrous matter such as those described. 
Those bundles at first are scattered irregularly 
through the stem, but in greater profusion towards 
the circumference. New bundles arise, grow, and 
increase in number towards the centre, until the 
stem is more or less filled with them, when it 
becomes hard and woody. Of course there are 
great differences as to the degree of rigidity which is 
ultimately attained, but the general process is as 
described. Palms, Sugar Cane, the Grasses, Cereals. 
&c., belong to this class. 
In the second class, or those which grow outwards 
from the centre, the phenomena exhibited are some¬ 
what different. There are present generally the 
same elements, viz., tissue made up of simple cells 
and vascular bundles composed of the variously 
altered cells already described, but the arrangement 
is on a different plan. The vascular bundles 
make their appearance just inside the out¬ 
side covering or rind, and are arranged in the form 
of a ring. At first they are separate from one 
another, but in process of growth close up so as to 
make a complete ring round the central cells which 
form the pith or soft central part of the stem. When 
new rings appear they are always placed outside the 
old ones, and in hard stems are very close together, 
and are mainly of a woody nature. These rings 
are clearly seen in the trunks of ordinary trees when 
sawn across. The circular arrangement of vascular 
tissue can be seen also by cutting a Potato across 
near the stem end. The pith or central simple cells 
is usually juicy in young plants, but often dries 
up in older plants altogether, and sometimes 
disappears, leaving a hollow space .—The Scotsman. 
COMING CHRYSANTHE¬ 
MUM SHOWS. 
Nov. 3.—Brighton (2 days).—Kent County (2 days). 
—Southampton.—Pembroke. —Watford 
(2 days).—Wells, Somerset (2 days).— 
Finchley (2 days). 
,, 4.—Ascot.— Ealing. — Cornwall (3 days).— 
Dalston (2 days).—Sittingbourne (2 
days). 
,, 5.—Highgate (2 days).—Camberwell and 
Peckham (2 days).—Grimsby (2 days).— 
Stroud (2 days).—Tottenham (2 days). 
,. 6.—Crystal Palace (2 days).—Bradford (2 
days). 
,, 7.—Crewe. 
,, 9.—St. Neotts.—Truro (2 days). 
,, 10.—National Chrysanthemum Society, at the 
Westminster Aquarium (3 days).—East¬ 
bourne (2 days)..—Kingston and Sur¬ 
biton (2 days).—Sevenoaks and West 
Kent (2 days).—South London (2 days). 
,, 11.—Bath (2 days).—Reading (2 days).— 
Bournemouth (2 days).—Faversham (2 
days).—Southend (2 days).—Guildford 
(2 days).—Southgate (2 days).—Chelms¬ 
ford.—Lewes (2 days).—Croydon (2 
days).—Lindfi .Id (2 days).—Dartford (2 
days).—Market Harborough (2 days). 
,, 12.—Barnsley (2 days).—Cranbrook I2 days). 
—Dawlish.—Hornsey (2 days).—Isle of 
Sheppey (2 days).—Westerham.—Win¬ 
chester (2 days).—Wimbledon (2 days). 
,, 13.—Cheshunt (2 days).—Derby (2 days). 
—Eccles and Patricroft (2 days).—Hayes. 
—Devon and Exeter.—Nottingham (2 
days).—Reigate.—Tooting (2 days). 
,, 14.—Bacup. 
,, 17.—Oxford.—Hartlepool (2 days). 
,, 18.—Hull (2 days).—York (3 days).—Cardiff 
(2 days). 
,, 19.—Bristol (2 days).—Crediton, Devon.—Nor¬ 
folk and Norwich (2 days).—Scottish 
Horticultural Association, Edinburgh 
(3 days). 
,, 20.—Bolton and District (2 days). 
,, 21.—Batley, Yorkshire. 
,, 24.—Hampstead. 
[The Editor will be greatly obliged to Secretaries 
for addition or corrections to the above list) 
