r December 30, 1899. 
K? THE GARDENING WORLD. 
2/5 
HEINEMINN’S 
Vegetable & Flower Seeds. 
Grown under his Personal Supervision. 
Pansy “Masterpiece,” 
Reduced Size, per packet, 1/-. 
Special collections for all purposes, from 2/6 and 
upwards. 
Unequalled Yalue. Flower Seeds Post Free. 
ORCHIDS 
clean Healthy Plants at Low Prices. 
ilaayt north a visit of inspection. Kindly send for Catalogue , 
JAMES CYPHER, 
Exotic Hnrseries, CHELTENHAM. 
DICKSON’S Jbester) CATALOGUE, 
No. 508, -for 1900, 
OF Select Vegetable and Flower Sieds, Seed 
Potato?, Garden Tool?, and Sundries is now ready, 
and can be bad post free on applica'ion. 
DICKSON’S, Seed Growers, Chester. 
‘ Gardening is the purest of human pi. asures, and the greatest 
refreshment to the spirit of man."— Bacon. 
Edited by J. FRASER. F.L.S. 
SATURDAY , DECEMBER 30 th, 1899. 
bushes equally on all sides, whether ever¬ 
green or deciduous, so as to make them as 
uniform as possible. There is another kind 
of uniformity that is equally offensive to the 
eye, and altogether objectionable. This is 
the practice of pruning large trees all to one 
uniform shape, not merely that straggling 
branches may be headed back, to make the 
trees more compact and symmetrical 
according to their kind, but to fashion them 
according to one preconceived ideal. When 
such trees are leafless they are often 
strongly suggestive of scarecrows. The 
system of pollarding tree-, especially 
Willows, in wet meadows is so common in 
the south that many have come to look 
upon such artificial creations as the right 
and proper thing. Naturally grown trees 
are, however, infinitely superior in everv 
way, more graceful, more umbrageous, and 
more handsome, whether seen from near or 
from far in the landscape. 
There should always be some object in 
pruning, though we fear that every wielder 
of the knife would be ready to affirm that 
he was guided by that aim. ff the object 
is that of utility or ornament, the hand 
must be guided both by reason and 
taste in the latter case, and at least by 
reason in the former ; otherwise there can be 
no intelligent pruning. In the case of fruit 
trees a considerable amount of skill and 
judgment are necessary to treat each variety 
of tree according to its natural inclin¬ 
ation to produce fruit buds at particular 
places of the previous year’s growth or 
otherwise. There is a considerable amount 
of variation even in this respect amongst 
Apples. Trees belonging to other species 
and genera also require sympathetic treat¬ 
ment, and he cannot be considered a skilled 
or expert fruit grower who has not carefully 
studied all these peculiarities. 
Flowering trees and shrubs require 
equally skilled treatment to secure the best 
effects they are capable of producing. It 
may be as well to remember here that 
sub-tropical effects from foliage are some¬ 
times desired, and that in this case pruning 
consists chiefly in cutting the branches 
hard back so as to encourage the develop¬ 
ment of rampant growth, for upon such the 
size of the leaves depends. Large leaves, 
each according to its kind, can only be 
obtained upon strong young wood, and the 
pruner is guided accordingly. When he is 
sent with his ladder, hammer, nails and 
shreds to prune flowering shrubs upon 
walls, a task has been set him that is not 
easily accomplished, if he is to acquit him¬ 
self properly of the task, unless he has 
previously been a keen observer of the 
habits of each respective species. Unless 
accompanied and closely superintended by 
a skilled hand, he is apt to overlook the fact 
that one tree may flower from the wood of 
the previous season, it may be in the spring, 
while another may flower on the young 
wood produced in summer. Should the 
present time be adopted for the pruning 
of walls, the wielder of the knife must not 
prune away the young shoots of Chinaan- 
anthus fragrans, Jasminum nudiflorum, 
Forsythia suspensa, Prunus triloba, nor 
Ribes speciosum, as all these flower on the 
wood made the previous summer. The 
first two mentioned would have been in 
flower by this time but for the ungenial 
weather. In the warmer and more favoured 
portions of the country this may have taken 
place. Their pruning must be deferred till 
flowering is over, after which they may be 
hard cut back if strong and vigorous. They 
can Mien be reduced within proper bounds. 
In the case of weakly specimens of Chimon- 
anth is it is better to leave a sufficiency of 
wood to cover the nakedness of the walls. 
The pruning of Lonicera sempervirens and 
many Roses may be accomplished at once 
DESCRIPTIVE & ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE 
Post Free on Application. 
Write for it by a Id. Foreign Post Card. 
F, C, HEINEMANN, 
Seed Grower, 
ERFURT, 5. GERMANY. 
LILIES! LILIES!! LILIES!!! 
Special Offer of 
JAPANESE LILIES, 
Lilium auratum, magnificent bulbs, 9/-, 6/-, and 4/- per 
doz, 
Lilium longiflorum, magnificent bulbs, 3/6 and 2/6 per 
doz. 
Lilium longiflorum eximium, magnificent bulbs, 6/- 
per doz. 
Lilium longiflorum giganteum, magnificent bulbs, 
61 - per doz. 
Lilium speciosum album Kraetzerii, 6/- and 4/- 
ptr doz. 
Lilium speciosum rubrum, 6/- and 4/- per doz. 
Lilium lancifolium album, 5/-per doz. 
H. A- TRACY, F.R.KS,, 
Orchid & Lily Importer, 
AMYAND PARK ROAD, TWICKENHAM 
SPRING FLOWERING BULBS 
At Clearance Sale Prices. 
Chloncdoxa Luciliae, 2s. per 100; ditto, Sardensis, 2s. per 
100; Crocus, large golden-yellow, 1st size, zs. 3d. per roo, 2nd 
size, is. gd., 3rd size, is. 6d. per 100; ditto, named varieties, 
i=. 6d. per 100; ditto, splendid, mixed, iod.; Galanthus 
Elwesii (the GiaDt Snowdrop), 2s. 100; ditto, Nivalis, single 
and double, mixed, is. 9d. per 100 ; Hyacinths, named varie¬ 
ties, 3s. and 5s. per doz.; ditto, bedding, mixed, 2S. doz., 17s. 
6d. per 100; Iris, English, named varieties, is. per doz.. 10s. 
per 100; ditto, ditto, choice mixed, 3s. per 100; ditto, 
Spanish named varieties 2s. 6d. pei 100; ditto, ditto, choice, 
mixed, is. per 100; ditto, Juncea, rich golden-yellow, is. 6d. 
per doz.; Polyanthus Naicissus, best named varieties, 7s. pe: 
100; ditto, choice mixed, 3s. gd. per 100; Daffodils, best named 
varieties, 5s., 7s. 6d., 10s. 6J. per 100; ditto, choice mixed, 15s. 
per 1,coo ; Jonquils, single, is. 6d. per 100 ; Scilla sibirica, 2s. 
per 100; single Tulips, best named varieties, 4s. 6d., 6s. 6d. and 
gs. per 100 ; ditto, best mixed, 2s. 6d. per 100; double Tulips, 
best named varieties, 5s. and 7s. 6d. per 100; ditto, best 
mixed, 2s. 6d. pei 100 ; Mixed Florists’ Tulips, 3s. per 100; 
mixed Darwin Tulip, 6s. per too; Tulipa elegans bright 
scarlet, is. per doz. ; ditto, Golden Crown, blight gold, edged 
crimson, 3s. per 100 ; ditto, Picotee, white, edged carmine, 8s 
per 100 ; ditto, Sylvestris, fragrant yellow flowers, 3s. 6d. per 
H. J. JONES, Ryecroft Nurseries, Lewisham, S.E. 
^|se and Misuse of the Pruning Knife. 
—It would be interesting to know what 
idea actuates the mind of many of the 
great army that wields the shears, the 
hedge-bill, the saw, the secateurs and the 
pruning knife. It may be, and no doubt is, 
the c;se that many of them are victims of 
mistaken notions, like the apprentice who 
was set to grind the tools in his master’s 
absence one day ; and, when asked at night 
whether he had ground all the tools, replied 
in the affirmative, except that he had not 
been able to grind down all the teeth ofthe 
big saw. To make a guess at the intentions 
of some pruners of deciduous trees whose 
handiworks vie have witnessed, one would 
imagine that they had been sent to give the 
trees a good hacking ; and if so, they 
carried out their orders to the letter. The 
jobbing gardener is often blamed for his 
accomplishments, but he is no doubt a 
victim of the order to tidy up the place, 
and give the inmates room to perambulate 
in the narrow confines of their gardens. 
Many owners desire to have gardens, yet 
from lack of knowledge and infimacy with 
the varying laws of Nature in each individ¬ 
ual case of the trees or shrubs, they pro¬ 
ceed to work or give orders in such a way 
as to show an utter lack of sympathy with 
the subjects in hand. 
We have seen a large Pear tree on the 
walls of a house, and one who was supposed 
to be an experienced hand was set to prune 
it. Not only was the breast-wood hard cut 
back but the spurs were cut back too, quite 
irrespective of whether there were fruit 
buds below the cut or not. This as a 
matter of course precluded the possibility 
of fruit the following season. Quite 
recently we heard of the good wife of a 
house taking a lit of gardening in her lord’s 
absence, and pruning the side shoots of 
the Vines hard back to the main rods, and 
that too while they were yet far from 
mature. Porsibly she had been reading 
about the installaiion of the new Adam in 
the gentle a t of gardening, and had felt 
justified in coming to the support ofthe 
new profession. There are those whose 
conception of pruning is to shear in the 
