May 30th, 1885. 
611 
STEVENS So CO.’S 
AMORTISER 
(NON-POISONOUS). 
Is., 2s., and 3s. per Bottle. 
Observe the Company’s Signature round the Cork, 
without which none are genuine. 
BEWARE OF SPURIOUS IMITATION'S. 
THE AMORTISER we particularly recommend for 
Greenhouses, it being so pleasant for use and for its 
perfume. Its properties for destroying insect pests, 
&c., is equal to our Carbon Paste. We guarantee, if 
used as per directions, it will not injure the most deli¬ 
cate foliage or blooms any more than water. 
P.S.—We highly recommend “ Beat’s ” Spray for light 
work ; it is a cork spray and will fit any bottle. It sends a 
very fine spray about 4 feet, and if the rose is removed will 
send it 12 feet with the greatest ease. This is the most useful 
spray we have ever seen, and may be used for many purposes; 
it requires no strength, and a child can use it. 
STEVENS So CO.’S 
CARBON PASTE 
(NON-POISONOUS). 
Four Gallons for One Shilling. 
Will destroy in a few moments the Larvae of the 
Aphides, Hop-Flea, Green and Black Fly, Mealy 
Bug, Thrip, Bed and White Spider, Brown and White 
Seale, American LJight, Woolly Aphis, Ants, Mildew, 
Ear-Wigs, Caterpillars, and all insect pests. 
1-lb. Tins, Is.; 3-lb., 2s. 6d.; 7-lb., 5s. 6d. 
TO HOP AND FRUIT GROWERS, FLORISTS, 
FARMERS, &c. IT IS INVALUABLE. 
STEVENS & Co.’s CARBON PASTE is a most 
wonderful and economical preparation, and is 
certain destruction to every kind of Insects that 
infests Trees and Plants, and we guarantee, if 
used as per directions, it will not injure the most 
delicate foliage or bloom any more than water. 
Manufactured only by 
STEVENS & CO., 
CHEMISTS, 
67, HIGH ST., BOROUGH, LONDON. 
Retail or all Chehists and Seedsmen. 
Special Quotations for large quantities. Sample sent 
for Is. 6 cl. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
“ Gardening is the purest of human pleasures, and the greatest 
refreshment to the spirit of man.”— Bacon. 
SATURDAY, MAY 30 tit, 1885. 
GaEDENEES AND THE ElECTOEAL FeANCHISE. 
—From a recent reply given to a correspondent 
in these pages, and from general allusions to the 
service franchise of the recently passed Fran¬ 
chise Bill by some of our contemporaries, it is 
evident that the gardening fraternity is alive to 
the fact that, with some exceptions, gardeners 
generally will now be able to enjoy an electoral 
privilege from which they have hitherto been 
debarred. We have nothing whatever, in dis¬ 
cussing this question, to do with the politics of 
our numerous readers, for the possession of the 
franchise cannot, or, indeed, we had better say, 
ought not to be a matter of party politics. It is 
not till the franchise is employed or used that 
party politics step in, and that phase of the 
question is not yet reached. 
There can be no doubt whatever that gardeners 
generally are as politically inclined as are other 
workers, and take as much interest in passing 
political events as any other section of the 
community. We may go further, and say that, 
as a rule, gardeners show in these things more 
than ordinary intelligence, because they are 
intelligent, educated men. Farther, their isolated 
positions, resulting from the nature of their 
occupation, which shut them off from association 
with much local activity and institutions, natu¬ 
rally leads them to pay close attention to 
imperial or national politics, because they can 
gather their intelligence respecting public events 
freely from the public press. There is a common 
assumption that gardeners invariably take their 
political cues from their employers. We are 
strongly disposed to regard that idea as an 
insulting one to the profession, and think most 
gardeners would reject such an impeachment 
with disdain. Whatsoever may be the political 
leaning of an employer, and howsoever much 
there may seem inducements on the part of 
gardeners to follow the same party leanings, yet 
it is certain that gardeners cannot only think for 
themselves, but, if need be, act also. One great 
help to this undoubted independence of action 
is found in the ballot-box, which, as it were, 
hermetically seals in eternal secrecy the vote 
which has been deposited within it. So far for 
the desire and competence of gardeners to take 
their part in electoral contests. 
Now, with respect to the power to vote. It is 
evident that the newly-established service fran¬ 
chise, which was a personal introduction into the 
Franchise Bill by the Prime Minister, gives the 
vote to every male occupier of a house or 
tenement which is separately occupied from that 
of the actual owner or employer, and whether 
the house or property in question be rated or not. 
Had the rating condition been still imposed, it 
would have shut out from the exercise of the fran¬ 
chise many schoolmasters, caretakers of schools, 
and officers in Government and other public 
institutions which are not rated when such 
officers, schoolmasters, &c., reside on the pi-emises. 
Gardeners who have occupied cottages or houses 
outside of their employers’ property, and which 
cottages have been rated to the relief of the poor, 
are just in the same position as all other ordinary 
house or cottage occupants, and the service fran¬ 
chise does not apply to them. But all gardeners, 
bailiffs, gamekeepers, coachmen, lodge-keepers, 
&c., who reside on their employers’ estates, and 
in tenements belonging to their employers, no 
matter whether part of garden, farm, or stable 
buildings, if separately occupied tenements, are 
not only entitled to havo their names placed on 
the parish register of voters, but the overseers 
are subject to penalties if they refrain from 
doing so. 
Of course, the same conditions as to residence 
apply to all householders, whether they are 
ordinary ones or get their votes through the 
service franchise, viz., they must have been in 
occupation from the month of July of the 
preceding year. So far all is plain sailing, and 
nothing open to disputation is evident. The 
gardener who occupies a tenement by virtue of 
his service, and in which tenement he must of 
necessity reside, is now as much an elector as 
the estate owner himself, or anyone else. The 
point over which it is possible some discussion 
may arise, however, concerns not the gardeners, 
nor the coachmen, but rather their under¬ 
gardeners and the grooms. It would be, indeed, 
a rare circumstance for these to occupy separate 
and distinct tenements, although now and then 
it may happen that an under-gardener occupies 
a room or two, commonly termed a bothy, all 
to himself in a garden. In such case, if the 
occupant has been in possession since the previous 
July, and is twenty-one years of age, his 
qualification can hardly be gainsaid. 
In the majority of cases, however, we find bothy 
rooms in gardens occupied by two or more under¬ 
gardeners, and these occupied jointly, neither 
having any right to claim as sole occupier. It is 
evident that these occupants cannot claim as 
lodgers, because a lodger impliesone who pays rent. 
It is equally obvious that the senior occupant, who 
perhaps is the foreman, cannot lay claim to special 
and sole occupancy, unless he should, as may 
be the case in some large gardens, occupy separate 
apartments solely for his own use and purposes, 
and to which none others of his colleagues have 
right or access. It has been thought that the 
granting of the franchise to under-graduates at 
Cambridge and Oxford created a precedent for 
similar claims being made by young garden men, 
but the cases are so far dissimilar that whilst the 
University students separately occupy apartments, 
which would elsewhere clearly entitle them to 
the lodger franchise, in the latter case the 
young men almost always occupy jointly, and 
such occupancy would not entitle them to the 
lodger franchise elsewhere. 
Of course, this line of reasoning would equally 
apply to under-coachmen and grooms in the one 
case, or to under-carters and young farm labourers 
in the other, as their positions are almost, if not 
absolutely, identical with those of under-gardeners 
resident in garden bothies. Even the under¬ 
graduates must of necessity find their position 
as electors greatly affected by the residential 
qualification, and the same would tell with even 
greater force probably in the case of under-gar¬ 
deners, for they seldom remain in one place more 
than three years after they are twenty-one years 
of age, and therefore it would often happen that 
they had not been a year in residence to entitle 
them to be on the voting register, especially when 
elections were pending. It must be very obvious 
that any form of franchise which stops short of 
actual personal qualification must always seem to 
deal unjustly with many persons who have active 
interest in political matters. The utmost that 
can be done in the direction of household suffrage 
has been accomplished by the recent Franchise 
Bill, but whether that Act is to prove final or 
otherwise is a matter with respect to which more 
will be known some few years hence. 
