36 
THE GARDENING WORLD 
September 17, 1898. 
the globe. We might extend the subject 
so as to include Oats and Barley, including 
the whole under the term corn. 
As the greater includes the less, so must 
gardeners and gardening be included in the 
general comprehensiveness of a question 
which concerns humanity. Sir William 
deduces his reasoning from facts and 
figures, not from dreamy speculation. The 
future must rest with the chemist if the 
prophet’s ideas are correct. The average 
production of Wheat per acre in the 
United Kingdom is 29^8 bushels ; but the 
average production of the world is only i2‘7 
bushels. In 1931, supposing the whole of 
the possible wheat-producing area is sown 
down, the population will by that time have 
overtaken the means of subsistence. What 
then will happen ? Sir William says that 
the present average weight of production 
per acre over the whole wheat-producing 
area of the globe must be raised ; and a 
dressing of nitrate will raise it from 127 to 
20 bushels per acre, a moderate computa¬ 
tion. This in the first place is absolutely 
necessary, seeing that the United Kingdom 
supplies only twenty-five per cent, of our 
requirements, the other seventy-five being 
imported. 
The Chili nitrate of soda, though 
seemingly exhaustless, will all have been 
spread over the surface of the land before 
1931. Our globe is surrounded by nitrogen 
in a free and gaseous state, but it is useless 
to plants in that condition. The slow, 
natural production of nitrate from the 
atmosphere by electrical discharges is alto¬ 
gether inadequate to meet the growing 
want that will make its presence felt 
thirty-three years hence. The president 
of the British Association says that 
the production of nitrate from the 
atmosphere by means of electricity is 
within measurable distance of realisation. 
Chili nitrate costs £~] 10s. per acre, and it 
will presently be spread over the surface of 
the globe at the rate of 12,000,000 tons 
annually. After that we must find the 
electrical power that will produce this 
amount annually from the atmosphere. A 
ton of it from this source is to cost ^"26, 
which at present cost and return must be 
excessive. By means of water power the 
cost per ton would be reduced to £ 5 . 
Anticipating the question as to whence the 
water power will be obtainable, Sir William 
Crookes points to Niagara, which will be 
adequate to the task without appreciably 
diminishing its flow. 
This vast scheme practically means the 
production of manure from the air, or that 
essential ingredient of an all-round manure 
that is at once the most expensive, the most 
valuable from a cultivator’s point of view, 
and the most difficult to obtain from its 
original source, as well as the most difficult 
to retain in the soil unless it is stored up in 
the form of decaying animal and vegetable 
matter, and then not readily or immediately 
obtainable by plants. Our feeble old earth 
requires stimulating to make her produce 
sufficient food for the support of her 
children. That is the ultimate end and 
object of the artificial production of nitrate ; 
but it includes a vast number of prior 
claims well known to the cultivator of the 
thousand and one articles that go to make 
up the sum total of human food. Should 
there be a dearth of manure to meet the 
requirements of the principal staff of life, 
all other and minor products would also 
suffer, leaving out of count the plants 
that are grown purely for pleasure, 
instruction, or amusement. The garden 
would undoubtedly be the first part of 
man’s estate that would suffer; and 
gardening would certainly assume a retro¬ 
grade movement, unless indeed in the case 
of leading necessities. Such a pessimistic 
view of the case may be entirely dropped if 
science, but particularly that of the chemist, 
is about to come to the rescue of the toiling 
millions of corn-eaters all the world over ; 
and in a smaller way to contribute to the 
elegancies, amusements, and luxuries of life. 
The production of nitrates through the 
agency of the germs, collectively termed 
nitragin, is as nothing compared with the 
vastness of the project which Sir William 
Crookes advocates and discusses ; but if he 
is to convert the nitrogen of the atmosphere 
into nitrate at the rate of 12,000,000 tons a 
year, what will happen to the atmosphere ? 
They don’t fear microbes there.—It is stated that 
there are no microbes on the Swiss mountains at an 
altitude of 2,000 ft. 
Messrs. J. Cheal & Sons, of the Lowfield Nurseries, 
Crawley, have won the /50 premium offered for the 
best plan, to be used in the laying out of a new 
public park at Wallsend, one of the suburbs of New¬ 
castle. 
It is estimated that 22 acres of land are necessary 
to sustain one man on fresh meat. The same space 
of laud, if devoted to Wheat culture, would feed 42 
people; if to Oats, 88 ; Potatos, Indian Corn, or 
Rice, 176; and if to the Plantain, or Bread-fruit 
Tree, 6,000 people .—Irish Farming World. 
United Horticultural Benefit and Provident Society. 
—The annual dinner of this society will take place 
at the Holborn Restaurant on Wednesday, October 
5th, at 6.30 p.m. Geo. Bunyard, Esq., has kindly 
consented to preside. 
Royal Horticultural Society.—The next fruit and 
floral meeting of the Royal Horticultural Society 
will be held on Tuesday, September 20th, in the 
Drill Hall, James Street, Westminster, 15 p.m. A 
lecture on " Fruit Growing in Suburban Gardens ” 
will be given at 3 o’clock, by Mr. W. Roupel 1 , 
F.R.H.S. 
Glasgow.—At the show held at Glasgow on the 
7th and 8th inst., for further account of which see 
another column, Messrs. Alex. Lister & Son, Meadow- 
bank Nurseries, Rothesay, were placed first for 
twenty-four fancy Pansies and also for twenty-four 
double Dahlias. This is following up the grand 
exhibit of Dahlias made by this enterprising North 
British firm at the recent show of the Royal Horti¬ 
cultural Society of Ireland at Dublin, which our 
reporter inadvertently omitted to mention. 
Death of Earl Winchilsea.—Scientific agriculture 
has lost one of its most distinguished patrons and 
supporters in Lord Winchilsea, who passed away at 
his residence at Haverholme Priory, Sleaford, on the 
7th inst., after a long illness. Co-operation amongst 
agriculturists was his lordship’s great point; and he 
lived to see it become, mainly through his own 
exertions, an established fact. The National Agri¬ 
cultural Union has made its presence felt throughout 
the country. 
London’s Ice Supply.—The abnormal heat of the 
last few weeks has caused a serious inroad to be 
made upon tbe stocks of ice laid in for metropolitan 
supply, although matters are not so bad as in Paris, 
where an ice famine is threatened. It is computed, 
however, that at the end of the season it will be 
found that London's consumption of ice will have 
greatly exceeded the average 1,000 tons per diem, 
the daily consumption of the past few weeks having, 
it is estimated, touched 2,000 tons. 
Messrs. Webb & Sons’ Bulbs—The 1898 catalogue 
of selected bulbs offered by Messrs. Webb & Sons,of 
Wordsley, Stourbridge, is in our hands, and we notice 
that, as in former years, there is no dearth of variety 
in the material supplied by this well-known firm to 
its customers. Collections of bulbs for both outdoors 
and indoors are offered by the Wordsley firm, thus 
giving its clients the benefit of its experience in the 
behaviour of the numerous varieties now in cultiva¬ 
tion. Amaryllis, Chionodoxas, Hyacinths, Tulips, 
Freesias, Gladioli, and Narcissi, together with many 
other subjects which are not, strictly speaking, bulbs, 
but which are associated with them by reason of the 
similarity of their planting seasons, all find a place 
in this catalogue, which is brightened up by a number 
of capital illustrations. 
An Old Oak.—Humboldt, the great traveller, 
describes an Oak tree which he saw in France which 
was estimated to be 2,000 years old. 
Nelumbium luteurh is one of the most conspicuous 
flowers at the present time in the United States. The 
plant has been domesticated in a number of ponds, 
has thriven amazingly, and the huge, fragrant, 
yellow flowers are much in request. 
Public Park for Widnes —The first prize of thirty- 
five guineas in the open competition for the best 
design for laying out the Appleton Park estate as a 
public park has been awarded to Messrs. Barron & 
Son, Elvaston Nurseries. Borrowash. The area of 
the park is about thirty-six acres. 
Not the right kind of training. — An American 
farmer who sent his son for a course to an agricul¬ 
tural college,says that when he came back " he turned 
out to be the most visionary cuss you ever'seed’ 
—he was chuck full of theories, but couldn't raise a 
paying crop to save his neck.” 
The Myth of the Weeping Willow.—The current 
issue of Meehan's Monthly gives an interesting fable 
which has been circulated concerning the Weeping 
Willow. This story has it that ‘‘Alexander Pope 
introduced the Weeping Willow into England. See¬ 
ing some unknown twigs around some article from 
the Orient, he planted them in his garden at 
Twickenham, saying that they might be something 
new, and so it proved. Slips were sent from the 
poet's Willow to a friend in the United States, from 
whence have sprung thousands. Pope died in 1744, 
and his Willow fell to the ground in 1801, notwith¬ 
standing the utmost care. Thoreau spoke of its 
being on'y the pistillate plant in this country, while 
some think the staminate may have later been intro¬ 
duced from Europe.” 
Belgian Horticulturists—The monthly meeting of 
the Chambre Syndicate des Horticulteurs Beiges et Societe 
Royale d'Horticulture et de Botanique de Gand took 
place at the Casino, Ghent, on the 5th inst. M. Ch. 
Spae presided over the jury. Certificates of Merit 
were awarded to a collection of cut flowers of Canna 
indica, comprising seventy varieties, shown by M. A. 
Gallet; to a collection of tuberous Begonias and 
early Chrysanthemums, sent by the same gentleman ; 
to Dracaena de Reuse, shown by MM. de Reuse 
Freres; to Lilium Madame van Steenkiste, sent by 
M. van Steenkiste ; and to a hybrid Odontoglossum, 
shown by M. Maurice Verbonck. 
Sweet Peas are now the glory of the garden in 
Perthshire, and elsewhere in Scotland. The haulm 
and foliage are as fresh and vigorous as if it were 
July instead of September. The same may be said 
of the hybrids of Phlox paniculata, P. decussata, and 
P. acuminata, popularly known as autumn-flowering 
Phloxes, and not inaptly so as far as the northern 
half of Britain is concerned ; for they are now in 
their full glory with young shoots arising in abun¬ 
dance from the base, and hiding the stems, which 
were rendered bare by the heat which has been pre¬ 
vailing for some time past. Neither the Sweet Peas 
nor the Phloxes are cumberers of the ground in old- 
fashioned gardens, for they are perfectly up-to-date 
in size, colour, sweetness, and in nomenclature with 
those in the most modern and progressive of gardens. 
Dutch Horticultural and Botanical Society.—At a 
meeting of this society held on August 10th, First- 
class Certificates were awarded to the Horticultural 
School of Wageningen for Canna hybrida O. J. 
Quintus ; to Messrs. E. H. Krelage & Son, of Haar¬ 
lem, for Chrysanthemum maximum Triumph, Cactus 
Dahlias Leonora, Regulus, and Ruby, Gloxinia 
hybrida grandiflora Cyclop and G. h. g. Goliath; to 
Mr. W. van Veen, of Leiden, for Cactus Dahlia 
Britannia; to the Horticultural School of Frederick- 
soord for Heliotropium peruvianum foliis variegatis; 
to Messrs. Gratama & Co., of Hoogeven, for Rosa 
hybridabifera Souvenir de Mme. Joseph Vervaene.and 
Rosa indica fragans Mme. Yvonne Gravier ; and to 
Mr. G. A. van Rossem.of Naarden, for R. i. f. Auguste 
Waltine. Mr. W. van Veen and Mr. K. Wezelen- 
burg, of Hazerswoude, also received First-class Cer¬ 
tificates for Chrysanthemum maximum Triumph. 
Certificates of Merit were awarded to the Horticul- 
