Jan. 31st, 1885. 
THE GARDENING WORLD, 
345 
which they are grown, they may be stood on a bed of 
ashes in the open-air, and be exposed to all the sun 
possible. The flowers must all be removed as they 
appear, and some of the kinds will require pinching 
at the points occasionally. These should be housed 
before frost affects them in autumn and allowed to 
come into flower in a house where a little warmth is 
afforded. Treated in this way, they afford a wealth 
of bloom, especially up to Christmas, after which the 
double varieties afford the most flowers, but will 
require a moderately brisk heat to keep them 
flowering. 
Nothing that I know of afford a greater profusion 
of bloom from September to January for the little 
trouble bestowed upon them, than do Zonal Pelar¬ 
goniums. The following are a few of the varieties 
which we grow largely for that purpose :—Vesta and 
Wonderful, also Mr. Marriot, shades of red, are indis¬ 
pensable varieties ; Deputy Veroy, La Grandeur, and 
Asa Gray, shades of pink; these are all double varie¬ 
ties. Fire King and Vesuvius we grow among the 
though it may be very well adapted to particular 
sites. In the stiff and formal age of Louis the Four¬ 
teenth, avenues were undoubtedly encouraged far 
beyond their merits. Consisting as they do of straight 
lines and forming high walls of foliage running 
sometimes across the park, before the windows or up 
to the front door, they could hardly be arranged so as 
to avoid the exclusion of certain parts of the land¬ 
scape -which ought not to have been shut out. 
But however undesirable and even ugly a wall may 
be when it obtrudes itself, an avenue of Limes is 
frequently a noble and interesting spectacle in itself, 
and in some situations, especially when its length is 
not considerable, it can be admired for its beauty 
without regret for the landscape it excludes, as in the 
case of the avenue depicted in the accompanying illus¬ 
tration, which leads up to one of the entrance lodges 
to Lord Braybrookc’s Park at Audley End. One of 
the most remarkable short avenues of Limes that I 
remember to have seen is in the Duke of Argyle’s 
park, reaching to his front door, at Inverary. The 
mantled house. At the present time it may be said 
to begin nowhere and end nowhere, and it obstructs 
no view, occupying rather low ground in a retired 
situation on the banks of the Mole, between Dorking 
and Brockham. 
Some of the biggest specimens of Limes with thick 
bushy branches growing close to the trunks are at 
Lavington, in the park of the late Bishop Wilberforce. 
They are pyramidal in habit, and nearly all the 
trees have produced a thick growth of twigs around the 
trunks, unseen till you pass beneath the spreading 
limbs and look upward. This peculiarity of some 
Lime trees may be due to their luxuriant growth on 
strong land. There is a fine spreading Lime, of 
Banyan-like growth, at Knole, and the noble avenue 
in The Quarry, at Shrewsbury, with many others might 
be mentioned. Let us give the Lime due honour for 
its rapid and lofty growth, and the honied store of food 
it provides for those four winged races which in early 
summer buzz and hum among its branches, for its 
classic antiquity and its European fame. And let it 
AN AVENUE OF LIMES AT AUDLEY END. 
single scarlets, Lady Emily, pink, and White Vesuvius 
and Niphetos as white varieties, all of which answer 
the purpose well, but most of the other varieties will 
do the same if treated likewise.— C. Warden. 
— s-' ~ ^MX >- Ta> -—c — 
THE LIME. 
The Lime is especially desirable in the making 
of avenues and pill boxes. I suppose there is no 
tree which interlaces better at the top and forms the 
high and pointed Gothic arch, the long drawn aisle 
of a noble avenue, better than the Lime, and only 
the white wood of the Willow can compete with it in 
the manufacture of those inevitable little boxes, such 
as puff boxes and the others which have just been 
mentioned. Useful as the Lime is, however, and 
indispensable in producing certain very legitimate 
effects in landscape gardening, it must be regarded 
so far as its individual merit is concerned, as an 
object more remarkable for singularity of appearance 
than for beauty. It came into fashion, in short, with 
that Dutch style of gardening which has now very 
justly fallen into disrepute as a general system, 
extent of grass around the Castle is limited by the 
comparatively narrow width of the glen, but the 
timber in this part of the park—for there is plenty 
of park elsewhere—is most ornamental. All the trees 
have been protected against the cropping of sheep and 
cattle, so that they feather to the bottom and their 
branches sweep the ground. The Limes, in their 
growth, have taken the least common and by far the 
most beautiful form, the columnar instead of the 
pyramidal. Another interesting short Lime avenue, 
lofty and architectural in its appearance, is at Shere 
in Surrey, running parallel with the stream near the 
rectory. 
In the same district, in Betchwork Park, which was 
first enclosed by Sir Thomas Browne, in the middle of 
the fifteenth century, and which was added to Deepdene 
by the late Mr. Henry Hope, there is the grandest 
Lime avenue I have seen for its great length and 
breadth and the large size of the trees, which have 
met and formed an arch at top. The two rows of 
Limes, which appear from the railway and elsewhere 
like one great wall of towering and massive vegetation, 
formerly approached to the door of the now dis¬ 
not be held responsible for the sin of Dutch garden¬ 
ing, the offence of the vegetable colonnade and the 
error of the formal avenue, since it is in several 
respects a tree unmatched and unrivalled in its 
merits. 
Limes are represented in England by a native 
species which ripens its seed here and has smaller 
leaves than any of the Continental varieties. The 
Limes of Europe extend from Greece and Spain to 
Sweden, and as far north as Siberia, the northern 
species being Tilia Europte, the same as our own ; 
the southern, T. grandifolia (Smith), and that of 
Germany and mid-Europe, T. E. microphylla, the 
intermediate species. The American Lime, T. 
Americana, is comparatively insignificant, reaching a 
height of only 30 ft. or 40 ft. 
The best soil for this tree should be neither too 
moist nor too dry, too heavy nor too light. A good 
loam or a moist but well-drained river-side site suits 
it best. It assumes its leafy garniture rather late in 
spring, and loses it early in the autumn, especially 
when growing in unkind soil, and for that reason should 
never be used for street planting.—IT. E. 
