June 10, 1898. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
611 
why they have been successful in life is their retiring, 
unaggressive natures. . . . While not aggressive, 
the Orchid is intensely selfish. Every plant is an 
individual working for its own benefit and that of its 
descendants. Like good business men, they take 
care of "number one,” but, unlike many of these, 
they never injure others. We may fancy one of them 
in some past age looking round on the struggle for 
life and saying, " What shaft I do ? I cannot fight 
because I am too fragile, but I can endure drought 
and starvation better than most others." So he took 
up a position where none of his rivals could live, and 
devoted his powers and energies to self-improvement 
and protection against every danger. That there 
were enormous difficulties to be overcome is shown 
by the wonderful contrivances that so many have 
acquired—contrivances which differ considerably, 
notwithstanding they may be for the same end.— 
James Rodway, in Longman's Magasine. 
Polyantha Rose Crimson Rambler. —We understand 
that the plant sent to the Great Exhibition of the 
National Horticultural Society of France ou May 
24th, as mentioned in our last, was in full bloom 
when sent out and packed in an ordinary matted 
basket. It was addressed to the care of M. 
Margottin fils, of Pierrefitte, who wrote to say that 
the plant arrived without a flower having dropped, 
thus showing its persistence and its capabilities to 
stand a long journey. It is said the flow’ers will keep 
in water for a fortnight. 
Wakefield Paxton Society.—At the meeting of this 
society, on the 3rd inst, Mr.' J. Haigb, of Sheffield, 
read a paper which had “ Plants in Pots ’’ for its 
title, and which proved to be a useful practical 
essay, which the members much appreciated. A dis¬ 
cussion followed, in which Mr. Thomas, gardener to 
the Bishop of Wakefield, Mr. A. V. Maher, fore¬ 
man Woolley Park Gardens, and others took part. 
The exhibition table was quite gay with greenhouse 
Rhododendrons from Woolley Park, and Pansies 
from Mr. G. Hudson, which made a pretty display. 
An exhibition of Roses, managed by a committee of 
the society, will be held on the occasion of the 
Wakefield Agricultural Society's Show, on July 8th, 
and on July 29th, the Society will hold its twelfth 
annual Cottagers’ Window Garden Exhibition, and 
Children’s Botanical Competition. 
Gardening and Forestry Exhibition. —The Duke of 
Connaught, attended by Col. E. Egerton, visited the 
exhibition on the 30th inst. H R H., escorted by 
Mr. H. Percy Dodson, inspected the exhibits in the 
forestry section, including the case which has been 
sent from Balmoral by the Queen, and then passed 
through the Rhododendron garden, Messrs Laing 
and W. Paul's exhibits exciting warmly expressed 
admiration. H.R.H. on passing into the grounds 
were at once impressed by Messrs. Cheal's miniature 
fruit garden, and after spending some time in 
examining the details expressed his intention to 
send his gardener from Bagshot to see it. The Duke 
then went through the western grounds and the 
Welcome Club enclosure, and expressed the opinion 
that the rearrangement was a great improvement on 
last year. 
The Birmingham Amateur Gardeners' Association.— 
Between 80 and 90 members of this Society and 
their friends recently visited Kenilworth and 
Stoneleigh Abbey in order to see two first-class 
gardens, one, that belonging to Mr. Henry Whateley, 
Kenilworth, where there is an extensive lot of glass 
devoted to Tomatos, Cucumbers, and Grapes, and 
where Mushrooms are largely cultivated on out¬ 
door beds. The party then proceeded to Stoneleigh 
Abbey, the residence of Lord Leigh, and saw through 
the mansion and the extensive kitchen gardens 
which are in admirable condition ; and then about 
the pleasure grounds. 
Popularity of the London Parks. —It was reported by 
the Parks Committee, on Tuesday, that for the purpose 
of ascertaining accurately the extent to which the 
Council's parks were used by the public they had the 
number of persons entering the parks on Whit 
Monday counted. The result was as follows.— 
Battersea Park, 109,783 ; Brockwell Park, 57,598 ; 
Clissold Park, 68,223 • Dulwich Park, 33,607 ; Fins¬ 
bury Park, 89,881; Kennington Park, 40,001; 
Myatt’s Fields, 8,546; North Woolwich Gardens, 
28,485 ; Ravenscourt Park, 20,597 ’• Southwark Park, 
9 I >°74 i Victoria Park, 303,516; and Waterlow 
Park, 49,255. The total number for the twelve parks 
was 900,566. 
-—4*- 
THE LATE MR. BARLOW. 
Being one of your many readers who have fre¬ 
quently enjoyed a good hearty laugh over the Lan¬ 
cashire stories told by the late Mr. Samuel Barlow, 
which have appeared at various times in The 
Gardening World, I send you a cutting from the 
Manchester Courier, of June 2nd, which may interest 
some other of your readers. The verses are by Ben 
Brierley, the Lancashire Poet, another proficient in 
the dialect of the County.— Wm. H. Smith, Sedgley 
Park Gardens, Prestwick, June 3 rd. 
IN MEMORIAM. 
Samuel Barlow, Born 1825, Died 1893. 
Twin goddesses of fruits and flowers, who sought 
To enrich the earth with summer wealth, inspired 
In mortal man a love that with it brought 
A yearning to create what man admired. 
Then Flora smiled, Pomona danced with joy. 
And filled the earth with sweets that could not cloy. 
And one they decked with coronals of bays, 
Entwined with golden fruit and flowers, meet 
For mortal so devoted in his days, 
To serve their ends, making the sweet more sweet, 
The earth more lovely, by his bounteous hand, 
As by the touch of a magician's wand. 
But Flora and Pomona now may mourn 
The sudden snatch from life of him who gave 
Life to where it was not, and strove to turn 
All things to beauty, even round the grave. 
Now blossoms he where blossoms never fade. 
A coverlet of flowers be with him laid. 
BEN BRIERLEY. 
Moston, Harpurhey, Manchester. 
Mr. Barlow maintained a close acquaintance with 
the successors to his father’s old friends and 
associates, and was a frequent and welcome visitor at 
the annual gatherings and the "fayberry" and 
Onion shows of the working-men botanists and 
gardeners of the county. Speaking at the Arts Club 
on one occasion, he said ; " I have mixed a good deal 
among gardeners. The old hand-loom weavers were 
good gardeners and sterling fellows. To them I owe 
a good deal of my success in floral and horticultural 
pursuits.” As a raiser, Mr. Barlow produced some 
fine varieties of Tulips and gold-laced Polyanthus. 
He had, at one time, some 500 seedling Auriculas, 
saved from carefully fertilised flowers. Three of 
them took high honours at one of the Auricula shows 
at South Kensington. In 1890 his collection of 
splendid English-grown Apples at Old Trafford 
excited immense interest. They had been grown on 
his estate at Llandudno, on the slopes of the Little 
Orme; and it was unanimously conceded by all the 
visitors to the Fruit Show, that they rivalled the 
choicest productions of the county of Kent, which is 
admitted to be the garden of England. Mr. Barlow 
was an active, if not the chief, promoter, of the 
Fruit Conference in Manchester, and he received in 
1891 the freedom of the London Fruiterers' 
Company, in recognition of services rendered in pro¬ 
moting the culture of hardy fruit in this country. 
Only once in the past 160 years had a similar honour 
been conferred. 
In ” The Winter's Tale,” referring to the operations 
of the gardener, Polixenes says :— 
" This is an art 
Which doth mend Nature—change it rather— 
But the art itself is Nature.” 
Mr. Barlow, not content with the beauties of the 
natural world, was an enthusiast for the creations of 
the artist as ordinarily understood, and he was also 
an excellent judge in this difficult department. He 
was a generous patron of painters. The Manchester 
School, so called, found in him an ardent supporter, 
and such artists as Mr. Anderson Hague, Mr. 
Houghton Hague, Mr. R. Gay Somerset, and Mr. 
Fred W. Jackson owed much to his early encourage¬ 
ment of their effjrts. He was also a great admirer of 
the work of G. F. Watts, R.A ,and owned many of his 
finest pictures, including ” The Red Cross Knight” 
and ”Tne Angel of Death.” The latter masterpiece he 
lent to the Jubilee Exhibition at Old Trafford. His 
collection was freely placed at the service of various 
exhibitions, the Manchester Arts Club especially 
benefiting by his generous aid. Of the Arts Glub 
he was one of the founders and its first president; 
and after the election of Lord Crawford of Balcarres, 
to the office he was elected a vice-president. 
Although he rarely ventured into the field of litera¬ 
ture, he was an able writer, as was shown not only 
by his biographical sketch of the late William 
Rathjens, the painter, and other similar contribu¬ 
tions on art, but by his occasional essays on horti¬ 
cultural subjects. 
But, after all, perhaps the most attractive attribute 
of this many-sided man was to be seen in his private 
life. He was rare company. All his life, and 
particularly in his earlier years, he had been a close, 
keen, and delighted observer of the humorous side of 
the Lancashire people ; and having a retentive 
memory, he accumulated a vast store of quaint 
anecdotes and amusing stories, with the narration of 
which in his own inimitable way, like a second 
Yorick, was wont ” to set the table on a roar.” The 
late Edwin Waugh found in him an inexhaustible 
mine of wealth, which he used in scores of his 
works, doubtless embellishing them by the resources 
of his peculiar genius, but obtaining the germ from 
the graphic veracity of the original narrator It is 
to be regretted that much of unrecorded worth will 
be lost by Mr. Barlow’s death ; but the memory of 
his fascinating art as a raconteur of genuine 
Lancashire stories, aided by a wonderful proficiency 
in the dialect, will long linger in the memory of those 
who were privileged to know him. 
The funeral took place on Thursday, in Middleton 
Churchyard, and was of a public character. The 
town was in mourning, the shops partially closed, 
the flags half-mast, and an immense concourse of 
people gathered near the church and in the grave¬ 
yard. A procession, headed by the borough police 
and the fire brigade, preceded the coffin, and included 
the members of the Town Council, the Corporation 
officials, members of the Middleton Liberal Club, 
representatives of the borough justices, a deputation 
from the Manchester Botanical Society (Messrs. 
Bruce Findlay, F. Robinson, W. Grimshaw, and B. 
Armitage), and about 100 of the workpeople of Stake- 
hill. The Manchester Arts Club was represented by 
Messrs. John H. Nodal, Ben Brierley, J. Houghton 
Hague, William Baldwin, C. W. Needham, J.W. 
Bentley, and J. Hampden Beckett; the Oldham 
Microscopical and other scientific societies by Mr. 
James Neild ; and the Manchester Botanists' Associa¬ 
tion by Mr. Thomas Rogers. The service, which 
was choral, was conducted by the Rev. T. E. 
Cleworth (rector), the Rev F Ramsbottom, and the 
Rev. W. H. Fothergill.— Manchester City News. 
-— 4 -- 
FRUIT PROSPECTS AT 
CHISWICK. 
Notwithstanding the cold and wet nature of last 
autumn there was a gorgeous display of bloom 
generally last spring in the gardens of the Royal 
Horticultural Society. The weather at the time was 
all that could be desired for the setting of the bloom, 
notwithstanding the frequent frosts which prevailed 
at night. Since then the long-continued drought 
has been the real crux of the question, and the crop 
of many kinds of trees will depend largely upon the 
amount of rain we get to prevent the dropping of 
the young fruit. 
The stone fruits, but particularly Peaches, 
Nectarines, and Apricots, are probably mostly out of 
danger ; but the heavy waterings which the trees 
have received by means of the hose for some time 
past will dispel any doubt upon the point that may 
exist with regard to the crop noiv in evidence. 
There is a good sprinkling of fruit on most of the 
Peach trees, and some of the latter bear even a 
heavy crop ; but on the whole the average is not so 
good as that of last year, and could hardly be 
expected, for it was quite exceptional in most gardens 
where Peaches were grown on open walls. The 
same may be said of Nectarines so that the crop is 
certainly well worth looking after. Some few years 
ago a set of young Apricot trees was planted on a 
west aspect wall, and they have now attained some 
size, mostly covering the walls. Of course the trees 
are planted tolerably closely together so that every 
alternate one may be removed and planted elsewhere 
if considered desirable, leaving space for the rest to 
be extended along the wall. They have now come 
into bearing, and although some of them are rather 
thinly furnished with fruit, others are bearing a good 
crop. Amongst those that might specially be 
mentioned are Moorpark, Breda, Shipley’s, 
and Kaisha. The first-mentioned bears the best 
crop, and the tree appears different from the rest by 
its small, richly-coloured leaves. The fruits are 
