Dec. 13th, 1884. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
237 
but sparingly, I was greatly pleased with some dishes 
of Lady Pigott, Standwell, and Lady Truscott, a dish 
of the latter being probably the heaviest dish of white 
rounds in the Show. Oval whites were numerously 
represented, Lady Gordon being shown in fine form 
and marked in my notes as a desirable acquisition. 
White kidneys were in perfection, and to Cosmo¬ 
politan must be awarded the palm in this class; 
nearly every winning collection containing splendid 
examples, fairly outweighing International Kidney, 
and Magnum Bonum. In the classes for two dishes 
this variety was shown in two out of the three winning 
sets. In the sections for early kidneys, Woodstock 
Kidney showed up with the heaviest and most 
handsome tubers. 
Coloured rounds were very numerous, Vicar of 
Laleham being the most shown among the dark 
skins. There -were but three dishes of The Dean 
staged, but these were sufficient to show that The 
Vicar will be eclipsed as soon as its seedling becomes 
better known. Beading Busset stood its ground 
well, and nothing handsomer could have been wished. 
Manhattan carried off the honours for the heaviest 
dish in this class. In the lighter coloured reds, or 
crossbreeds as I prefer to call them, the number 
of dishes of Adirondack surprised me, all equally 
well grown. Beauty of Badstock seemed to have 
lost ground so far as size was concerned, and was to 
be found in only a few collections, while Blanchard 
a variety after the same type, was evidently in favour- 
Tifflie’s Annie, a novel-looking sort, and Early Bed 
Emperor, Purple King, and Lord Kosebery were 
jotted down by me to be tried next year. 
SECTION OF GRAPE TROUGH. 
Coloured kidneys, in almost all shades imaginable, 
constituted by far the largest section of the Exhibition. 
White Elephant appeared at a discount, as I could 
find only two dishes staged. The same may be said 
of most of the old American Bose tribe. Mr. Bresee 
appears still indispensable, the handsomest dishes 
being of that variety. A dish of a purple kidney, called 
Alliance, formed one of the best in a winning collec¬ 
tion of eight dishes. Edgecote Purple showed up 
well, and will evidently rise in favour as it is better 
known. Sir Garnet Wolseley, a red mottled kind, 
Caunce’s Favourite, and W. E. Gladstone, I noted 
as varieties in this class, new to me, and worthy of 
a trial.— J. Kniglit , Bilston. 
- 'j- - - 
White Celery. —Three years ago, when taking a 
trip into the southern counties, I called at Norman- 
hurst, near Battle, the seat of Sir Thomas Brassey, 
M.P., and although a stranger to the worthy gardener, 
Mr. Allen, I was well received by him. After showing 
me round the houses, which were in the finest trim, 
we walked on to the pleasure-grounds, and there I 
beheld the finest collection of conifers it was ever my 
good fortune to witness. I was then ushered in 
between the garden walls, and there felt in my 
element. The first thing I noticed was a quarter of 
dwarf White Celery, which I looked upon with great 
admiration, and concluded that this Celery was the 
pick of Mr. Allen’s excellent quarters of vegetables. 
. then resorted to the most honest of all trades, 
viz., begging, and Mr. Allen was good enough to 
favour me with two roots, which I brought home and 
seeded. I leave you to give the readers of The 
Gardening World your opinion of it.— R. Gilbert, 
Burghley .— [The flavour was very good; but the 
specimens sent, being trimmed, we are unable to say 
u it is distinct from White Plume.— Ed.'\ 
WARD’S GRAPE TROUGH. 
At one of the late autumn fruit shows held in 
connection with the Health Exhibition, Mr. George 
Ward of Bishops Stortford, who a few years ago was 
a very successful grower and exhibitor of Pine Apples, 
and is now as well-known as a large grower of Grapes, 
exhibited a new trough which he has invented for 
GRAPE TROUGHS AGAINST A WALL. 
keeping Grapes after they are cut from the vine. The 
trough is made of glazed earthenware, oblong in 
shape, and about 17 ins. long. The troughs are single 
and double in form, the former for fixing with L- 
shaped holdfast against walls, and the latter for 
standing on wood-frames constructed as shown in the 
illustration below. The method of fixing and using 
them will be clearly seen on reference to the larger 
scale sections. 
Both single and double troughs have a flange or 
ledge, f. f. The shoot bearing the bunch of Grapes 
should be cut sufficiently long to admit of the bunch 
hanging free of the trough, while the end of the 
shoot is lodged under this flange as shown. No tying 
or fastening of any kind is required, the weight of 
the Grapes being sufficient to hold the bunch in 
position. By this simple contrivance much labour 
and trouble is avoided. The Grapes hang in their 
natural position, without the trough being tilted, and 
consequently there is no danger of any drip, or of 
the end of the shoot being out of the water, though 
the trough need not be filled brim-full. Water can 
ward’s grape rail and trough. 
be put into the troughs without disturbing the Grapes, 
and each bunch can be lifted out for examination, and 
replaced with the greatest ease. 
The troughs are not placed close up end to end, but 
kept about 7 ins. apart, as shown in the sketches. It 
would be useless to place them too close, because if a 
bunch is hung at the extreme end of each, another 
could not in any case be placed between. Mr. Ward 
has found his troughs of great value to him in keeping 
a large quantity of Grapes from January to April, and 
many practical men who have seen them have expressed 
unqualified approval of the invention. 
HEATH AND HEATHER. 
Botanically considered, the heaths (for there are 
many) belong to the great and very beautiful family 
which has for its most imposing members the 
arborescent Bhododendrons of the Himalayas and 
Ceylon, and for its tiniest, that delightful little fairy, 
the moss-Andromeda of Lapland. The heaths them¬ 
selves occupy a middle place in regard to dimensions : 
the points of resemblance in the entire company are 
found in the structure of the flowers, and in the same 
kind of give-and-take of aggregate characters which 
unites the members of all other comprehensive 
orders. Two or three of the very plentiful species, 
occurring in Southern Europe, attracted attention 
more than 2,000 years ago, the ancient Greeks plainly 
intending them in the name ereike, met with now 
and then in their dramatic and pastoral poetry, 
jEschylus, in that splendid passage in the Agamem¬ 
non, where we have the description of the news being 
conveyed by means of beacon-fires lighted upon 
mountain-tops, beginning with “ a brilliant gleam 
from Ida,” the signal thenceforward “travelling 
joyously,” says that the watchmen of Messapius did 
SECTION OF GRAPE TROUGH AND RAIL. 
their own part well by kindling a blaze with 
withered heath. Theocritus, in his Fifth Idyll, 
represents the rival musicians as calling in for umpire 
a woodman engaged in cutting ereike. The Greek 
word travelled into Italy, settling there as part of the 
vernacular, but (though employed by Pliny) it does 
not seem to occur in the Boman poets : nor indeed do 
we come upon it again for fifteen centuries, or till the 
period of the revival of learning in Western Europe. 
In 1542, temp. Henry VIII. of England, that admirable 
old botanist Leonard Fuchs, of Basle (so deservedly 
commemorated in the name of the Fuchsia), gives in 
his Historia Stirpium, p. 254, a drawing, singularly 
accurate, like most of his other plant-pictures, of the 
Calluna vulgaris (the “common heath ” or “ heather” 
of to-day), underwriting it “ erice, German heyden.” 
In 1586, Mathiolus, of Florence (in honour of whom 
we call the Brompton-stock, Matthiola), gives a similar 
but inferior woodcut representation, with various 
European synonyms. 
Botany, in those days, was only finding its feet, so 
that no wonder the name erica got passed on to 
various other plants of similar habit and complexion, 
as the Tamarisk, the Crowberry, and others figured in 
Gerard’s Herbal, published towards the close of 
the reign of Elizabeth. The Germanic “ heath ” 
followed suit, denoting, in these early days, any little 
wiry ligneous plant, with slender leaves, especially if 
an inhabitant of the wilderness. Hence the appear¬ 
ance of the word in the authorized version of the Old 
Testament (Jer. xvii. 6 and xlviii. 6), the proper sense 
of the original Hebrew, ’ar’ar and ’ar’o er, being in 
all likelihood, savin. By and by, when Botany 
became an exact science, and “ genera ” were estab- 
