May 23rd, 1885. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
597 
Dissenting chapel. There is no public-house on the 
estate. 
My informant and his wife, a staid and elderly 
couple, have resided at Heronsgate for thirty-eight 
years. He is sixty-seven, and was originally a 
farm-labourer, but had been employed in nurseries 
occasionally, and also in gardens. Industrious, frugal, 
and healthy, he was just the type of peasant proprietor 
likely to succeed, a man who might have been wealthy 
ere this had he emigrated to New Zealand or Canada. 
His plot consisted of four acres, about two-thirds of 
which grew Barley and Oats. He had a pony, several 
pigs, and a score head of poultry. The remaining third 
of the four acres was cultivated as a market garden 
early Potatos and Peas being his principal vegetables. 
But an important source of income was his Cherry 
grove ; this consisted of a score fine trees of Bigarreau 
and “ Croons,” now literally smothered with pendant 
A matter of the first importance with regard to the 
success of a peasant proprietary is the proximity and 
ease of access to a manufacturing town, where the 
produce of the little farms would be likely to find a 
ready sale. Next to this consideration a wise discre¬ 
tion must be exercised in the choice and proportion of 
the various crops to be grown. The tenant must not 
expect to compete with the farmer in growing cereals 
or raising stock. Butter, milk, poultry, and eggs, are 
always in demand; so, too, are early vegetables and 
bush-fruit, and there is a constantly increasing demand 
for hardy flowers. A conclusive proof that the supply of 
garden produce is inadequate may be gathered from 
the fact that upwards of £6,000,000 worth are 
imported yearly from the Continent. The launch¬ 
ing of the Company under such highly promising 
auspices is one of the most hopeful and encouraging 
signs of the times. We wish it every success. 
the as constant green-fly plague on the Rose-bud? 
You thought not; so I must direct the attention of some 
of your thinking correspondents to those negative bright 
spots on a dark ground of the above picture, and ask 
them the reason why those plagues have ceased their 
troubling so far—at least around here ? From long 
experience I am well aware that slugs bury themselves 
from snow and hail. 
Giant Anemone Cokonabia.— What would you say to 
a bed of seedling Anemones in which the blooms were 
so large and so numerous as to utterly hide the foliage ? 
This was literally a sight several of your readers, as 
well as I, observed at Mrs. Gough’s garden at Birdhill 
the other day. Here is the secret, and it may interest 
others as well as Messrs. Gilbert and Dean, as you 
never seem to have them ins. in diameter in 
England and Scotland. Grow them as annuals ; sow 
when the seed is ripe in a bed made of rich fresh loam, 
A NEW SIDE-SADDLE FLOWEE : SAEEACEXIA COUF.TII. 
blossoms. There were also Apples and Pears, all 
worked by his own hand ; Black Currants, Goose¬ 
berries, Raspberries, and Strawberries. 
Until lately my informant spent half of his time on 
neighbouring farms, and after a hard day’s work, as 
his wife said, he would frequently set to work on his 
little estate and continue at it till midnight. “ Afore 
I came here there was a beautiful orchard on this 
spot, and it was all grubbed up, apictur’of desolation.” 
Why -was this we ask ? “ Because all should share 
alike,” was the reply. “ I wished myself home again 
many a time,” said the wife. “ What about plough¬ 
ing?” we inquired. “Oh, there’s no difficulty here ; 
there are two or three small farmers always willing 
to come and do a little carting. We get ploughing 
done at 12s. an acre.” “ What is your fellow-tenant 
who came with you ?” “ He’s a sawyer, and does a 
bit of carpentering. Nobody could get a living here 
without something else to fall back on.” Years ago, 
there was only one greengrocer in the town, now there 
are twenty. 
NOTES FROM IRELAND. 
Gajrdenino Weathek. —I cannot remember more 
unseasonable or more ungenial weather than that 
with which we were blest or-during the past ten 
days of the—“merry,” shall I say?—month of May. 
Well, we must take the goods the gods have given ! 
But are these good ? Is there a bright side, from a 
gardening point of view', to such May weather as 
pitiless, pelting hail showers, often lasting a quarter - 
of-an-hour, with the “hail-stones,” veritable stones, 
going right through tender leaves, and making “ mince¬ 
meat ” of Apple, Pear, Plum, and Cherry blossoms ? 
Snow on the hills around, and Potatos (early) planted 
in the open badly burned! Another very remarkable 
circumstance I noticed at Birdhill a week ago was the 
early Strawberry fruit-buds blackened and frost-bitten 
through. Plainly, there is no bright side to that; but 
look further. No slugs and no aphis ! 
I asked you recently, would the visitation we 
are having of the bad weather above referred to 
explain the absence of the customary Rose maggot, and 
2 ft. deep—they are voracious feeders—and rub sand in 
along with the seed ; no transplanting on any account; 
select seeds of only the largest flowers and best 
colours; and lastly, never use the same soil or same 
roots a second year. Mr. Burbidge sows now in pre¬ 
pared beds, in sunny borders, with the view of having 
them in bloom next winter. I am making a bed with 
the same view to-day. It was, however, to see some 
five dozen monster plants and monster blooms of 
Calceolarias (Carter’s strain) that we went to Birdhill, 
as well as a consignment of imported Orchids, sent to 
Mr. Gough by his relative, General Gough, from India 
direct ; but of these more anon.—I V. J. Murphy, 
Clonmel. 
The damage caused in Kent by the frosts of last 
week has been very serious in respect to Gooseberries 
and Black Currants in exposed situations, and also to 
the most delicate descriptions of Cherries. It is found, 
however, upon a close examination that the injury 
inflicted generally among the fruit orchards and 
gardens is not of so severe a character as the 
earlier reports represented. 
