11 Gardening World, December 5, 190S. 
MOTTO FOR THE WEEK: 
Jdture is the only book that teems with 
ing on every page.”— Goethe. 
CONTENTS. 
nteur's Letter to Amateurs, An 747 
i s under Fruit Trees, Planting 754 
nations, A Famous Raiser of 
: us.) . 752 
1 anthemum Merstham White 
( us.) .—. 75 1 
) petition Awards . 74 § 
0 tire Within . 75 ^ 
cer Garden. The (illus.) . 749 
•: Garden, The (illus.) . 749 
r nhouse. The Amateur’s . 749 
Diculture, The French System of 755 
nen Garden, The (illus.) . 749 
r ids for Amateurs . 75° 
(sagator, The Speedy . 755 
: Pruning cf Fruit Trees (illus.) 754 
is, In the Garden of . 753 
. ig-room Gardening . 75 s 
nil Climbers, A Selection of ... 759 
i'aria Chinensis . 74 § 
cc of the Week . 749 
ivranlhes . 74 § 
Some ??o\5«bs. 
green Yule makes a fat Kirk-yard. 
immer in winter or summer’s flood, 
iver boded England good. 
-frosty winter and a dusty 7 March, 
; d a rain about Aperill; 
i ’d another about Lamas time, 
Gen the corn begins to fill; 
i worth a plough of gold, 
: d all her pins theretill. 
hw Year’s Eve night wind blow south, 
tokeneth warmth and growth ; 
bst much milk, and fish in the sea ; 
' rth much cold and storms there will 
lie; 
st the trees will bear much fruit; 
wth-east, flee it, man and brute ! 
CLXXII. 
Picturesque Tree Stumps. 
At this season of the year it may be 
that one or more trees are being felled, 
and perhaps we see huge and picturesque 
hollow stumps that we wish to utilise in 
the garden. My own experience is that 
a really artistic use may 7 be made of them 
to bring a mass of colour to some position 
that has neither bed nor border. Very 
often excellent effects are gained, and a 
sense of breadth and spaciousness, if w r e 
can carry the eye to some mass of colour 
beyond what we have been accustomed to 
do. To a certain extent we may do this 
with tubs or large pots, but again, in the 
less formal positions, these hollow tree 
stumps may 7 be in more beautiful fitness 
and harmony with their surroundings than 
the manufactured tub or pot. I have 
also seen these stumps charmingly used 
to bring colour to the lawm that was not 
otherwise broken up. 
I must add a w 7 ord or two as to the 
manner in which they 7 were treated. In 
one garden they were planted with those 
things that completely mantled them and 
hung down in ample cascades of blossom 
about them. Some of them in early sum¬ 
mer became dazzling white masses with 
the flowers of Cerastium tomentosum, 
and when the flowers w 7 ere gone there was 
still the silver-white foliage, which is only 
a little less decorative, for the rest of the 
year. Others of them produced great 
cascades of yellow or red, or rose-coloured 
Rock Roses (Helianthemums), and these 
also hung down the sides in delightful 
fashion, and the foliage is evergreen, 
which is a great point to remember in ap¬ 
prising the decorative value of these use¬ 
ful plants. There is one thing necessary 
in thus establishing the Cerastium and 
the Rock Roses, and that is to secure for 
them an open sunny position, as they are 
both revellers in the sunshine. Another 
use w 7 e may make of tree stumps is to 
bring them into charming prominence in 
the Fernery. My contention is that here 
they are in harmony and fitness with their 
surroundings, but that they 7 are out of 
place and undesirable in the rock garden, 
though I know w 7 ell enough they are often 
used there. 
The Fernery. 
There are many kinds of beauty to be 
achieved in the garden, but nowhere shall 
we achieve green, cool, serene beauty— 
the beauty of quiet stillness—as w 7 e shall 
in our Fernery if we place it well and 
try to bring its setting and surrounding 
into fitting accord. There must be some 
aspect and position in the garden, cool 
and quiet, and there we may well make 
our Fernery 7 , and if it be anyway 7 pos¬ 
sible, let us have a pathway through it. 
Let us walk with Ferns on either side of 
us : to be able to do so gives a great sense 
of completeness and a picturesqueness 
not lightly to be foregone. In small 
gardens so often I have seen some arid 
corner piled high with poor barren soil, 
some tree stumps, and some few miserable 
specimens of Ferns, or, worse still,' I 
have seen—and I always shudder at the 
recollection—the miserable scanty 7 Ferns 
growing out of a hideous erection of great 
pieces of white spar. That is not the 
Fernery 7 I would have my readers achieve, 
a thousand times no. To begin with, I 
would not have it quite near the house, 
if I could help it, for here we want a 
gayer, brighter beauty. Then let us see 
to it that we give our Ferns soil good 
enough to nourish and develop them, and 
not merely 7 sustain hungry, struggling 
specimens; their luxuriant growth is their 
great charm. And, lastly 7 , I would say 
do not pile up the soil into a steep mound. 
That means exceedingly sharp drainage, 
and although Ferns do not like a stag¬ 
nant, sour soil, still they 7 do not flourish 
as they should when they are left high 
and dry 7 for weeks during the summer. 
Another point I would mention is a some¬ 
what singular one. I have noticed many 
times that the tree stumps are laid side¬ 
ways upon the ground. But, surely, a 
far more artistic grouping can be effected 
if some of them, at any rate, are put into 
the soil on end as if they had grown 
there. My idea of a small and unpre¬ 
tentious Fernery 7 is a grouping of Ferns 
round about sparsely planted trees, mak¬ 
ing-, perhaps, some pretty dell. Birches— 
silver Birches—and Ferns are magicallv 
beautiful in close association. 
Ths Clematis in the Garden. 
As indispensable as the Rose is the 
Clematis for decorative value, and we 
might well introduce it far more gener¬ 
ously than we do. A house covered with 
Clematis has a beauty that arrests every 
eye that sees it. Covered, I say, for too 
often we are content with a solitary 7 speci¬ 
men. Reader, have you ever seen the 
whole front of a house a mass of rich deep 
blue Clematis ? That is an object lesson 
in the value of massing that will remain 
with you as an unforgettable thing. Or, 
if we prefer an earlier display, a house 
covered with Clematis montana grandi- 
flora is quite charming. I always think 
we should reckon our walls in our garden 
area, and call upon them to lend their 
quota of colour and beauty to the rest. 
It is wonderful what this additional 
amount of colour space will do to in¬ 
crease the beauty of the garden. We 
have to remember that to all climbing 
plants the quality of gracefulness is in- - 
herent, and we want gracefulness as one 
of the charms of our gardens. 
F. Norfolk. 
-- 
Nephrolepis amabilis. 
The fronds of this Fern are long and 
narrow with all the pinnae crested, while 
the apex may be forked or tasselled by- 
being cut into a number of points. The 
fronds are 2 ft. to 24 ft. long. First- 
class Certificate by the R.H.S., when 
shown by Messrs. Hill and Son, Lower 
Edmonton, in November, 
