«December 1, 1904 -THE AUSTRALIAN GARDENER. 9 
at the lower end and a foot high at the 
upper. These are made as light and open 
“as possible. The six holes, bored at about 
4 inches apart, carry six funnel shaped 
cups about 14 inches across at the top and 
4 inches deep, the whole concern being 
painted black. ; 
A space ef a few inches was allowed 
_ between each stand to give room to the 
public to leisurely and carefully inspect the 
cuts. Hach carnation was staged in its 
cup with a piece of carnation foliage, or 
*‘ grass,” as the knowing ones callit, The 
tendency to-day seems to be to display 
everything with its own natural foliage. 
We give these particulars because they will 
be of interest to the rapidly growing num- 
ber of carnation fanciers all over the 
_ country, and may serve to give them some 
_ ideas that may be useful in their own local 
‘shows. 
We noticed carnation growers from 
Broken Hill, Port Pirie, Burra, Gawler, 
Angaston, and several other country towns, 
“all busy with their notebooks, and more 
than one of them measuring the stands with _ 
a small pocket-tape. 
We believe that the time is coming when 
the Chrysanthemum shows will have to 
admit the carnation as an equal and pos- 
sibly as the predominant partner, and that 
it will give new life to the practice of hold- 
ing autumn shows. 
_ A further admirable feature of the dis- 
play was the careful naming of every 
flower staged, probably over 2,000 separate 
distinct cuts, not, of course, including the 
vase classes and those not for competition. 
Weat white cards about 3 inches long and 1 
inch wide with two small holes punched in 
the centre carried the name of each exhibit, 
and each card was hung by a small, thin, 
black hairpin from the edge of the cup 
carrying the cut. 
The large number of visitors who used 
pencils and notebooks conclusively showed 
the good sense of naming the exhibits. 
__. Wecommend the Society for making the 
Show an honorary one. Far too many 
growers produce and exhibit blooms purely 
for the money that is in it, and far too 
often rely upon their friends to help them 
to make up their stands. We are glad to 
believe that the reprehensible practice of 
Hower-mongering is not pursued by the 
tnembers of the S.A. Carnation Society. 
Wo man who has a true sense of honor or 
asportsmanlike feeling will try to beat his 
opponents with borrowed flowers. When 
the does he is like the jackdaw wearing the 
peacock’s feathers, and he deserves to be as 
mercilessly shown up. The practice is a 
despicable and detestable one, and we trust 
the Society will always be able to be proud 
of possessing. members who will not 
flescend to such meanness. 
We would suggest to the energetic and 
go-ahead committee of the Society that 
_mext year they get the prize-winning 
tickets put on the exhibits at the time of 
judging, as.is done at many of the country 
shows. Two stewards should accompany 
the judges, one with a supply of Ist and 
2nd prize tickets in his pockets and a good 
Hegible black pencil, the other calling the 
winning name and] the class from his book. 
The judging and ticketing would then be 
done together, and a lot of trouble and 
“worry taken off the hard-worked, breakfast- 
less, and dinnerless secretary’s hands. 
Before going to the prize-list we must 
refer to the splendid exhibit of the Sydney 
growers, Messrs. Goodwin, Gazzard, and 
Morris, Messrs. Heyne and Potter acting as 
agents for them. Some 60 or 70 perfect 
show blooms of every class known were 
exhibited. The oxquisite perfection and 
_variety of shades and the wonderful condi- 
tion of the flowers proved an eye-opener to 
our plains growers, and the general opinion 
was expressed about as follows :—‘‘ Where 
those flowers were grown thrip does not 
exist or is no trouble, and scorching heat 
and drying winds, and troublesome ants are 
absent ;” and it in many cases, to our 
knowledge, simply confirmed growers of the 
perpetual type in the opinion that the 
spring flowering or annual blooming type is 
one that it will pay well to let alone, at 
least on the Adelaide plains. These Sydney 
flowers were apparently dressed, and every - 
flower had a white cardboard collar around 
its neck just large enough to show the out- 
line of the petals, and just tight enough to 
prevent a burst calyx from showing. We 
trust that the Adelaide Society wili not 
adopt this artificial style of staging. 
In the spring flowering sect on Mr. H. 
H. Ising won with “The Gift;” Mr. J. F. 
Sudholz being second with ‘ Triumph.” 
In the decoratives Mr. J. Beggs came first 
with ‘Stella ;” and Mr. A. H. Glastonbury 
second with ‘‘Mrs, J. W. Potter.” In 
tree shows, Mr. A. H. Glastonbury with 
‘‘ Ravenswood” was first; and Mr, Ff. H. 
Prince with ‘‘ Thos. Hill’ was second. 
Mr. J. McInnes was first for champion 
picotees. If better picotees cannot be 
staged than those shown we should advise 
the abolishment of the class. Mrs. W. 
Thomas was second. The two best South 
Australian raised seedlings were exhibited 
by Dr. Harold. One, ‘‘ Glendeloch,” being 
a magnificent smooth-edged deep yellow 
with bright red splashes—a most effective 
flower; the other being of the Princess” 
ground with cerise 
Alice type, white 
raised by Mr. 
splashes. Both were 
McGann, who states he has disposed of his” 
interest in ‘“‘ Glendeloch” to Messrs. Smith’ 
The former took- 
and Menzel, of Aldgate. 
the championship for a tree show variety ; 
the latter for a tree decorative one. 
To a Sydney grower, and possibly to a 
Melbourne one,-the feature probably most 
surprising would be the number of speci- 
mens of the American type in the tree 
decorative lists. South Australia has the 
kudos of first discovering and recognising 
the invaluable qualities of this type, one 
grower, Mr. J. Beggs, having imported a 
number of the best sorts from the States. 
The other distributors of these flowers; 
Messrs. Smith & Menzel, of Aldgate, raised 
a batch of 200 seedlings from the choicest 
hand fertilised American seed five years 
ago, and sent out over a dozen varieties, of 
which, ‘‘ Pasadena,” one of them, won first 
prize with nine votes to spare in the 
plebiscite taken by the “S.A. Register’ 
recently. : i 
In regard to the judging we must say 
that in more than one class the decisions: 
turned out to be the opposite of the popular 
- defective. 
verdict, notably so in the class for twelve 
carnations, dissimilar, where the first prize 
was awarded to twelve of which at least six 
were defective blooms, against twelve in 
which not more than two could be called 
Judging, however, is a dis- 
tinctly thankless task, and where 17 entries 
occur in one class it is no joke to make a 
decision. 
The carnations were not the only features, 
for in addition to the cut flowers staged and 
the six decorated tables, the baskets, bou- 
quets, and buttonholes, the Show was 
greatly enhanced by the magnificent dis- 
plays of rhododendrons from Professor E. 
CO. Stirling’s and Mr. John Bagot’s gardens 
in the hills; also by the fine displays of ~ 
Ghent Azaleas, Roses, Delphiniums, Pan- 
sies, Petunias, Gladioli, Maples, and 
general collections of cut flowers. Among 
the latter the most notable perhaps were 
one set of three exhibited by Professor 
Stirling, viz, Kalmia — latifolia, Protea 
Cineracoides, and Genista Andraeana. 
The Society is to be congratulated in 
every way for the very distinct success of 
the Show, and we trust that eacb year will 
increase its popularity. 
EXHIBITING HARDY FLOWERS. 
This is a matter which has never yet 
received the consideration it deserves. It is 
quite distressing sometimes to see bunches 
of our best hardy flowers jumbled up 
together, with little or no effect, and often 
with about twice as many sprays of blos- 
soms in the bunch as are really needed to 
display the subject properly. The idea in 
the minds of those making the exhibit ap- 
pears to be that of creating a dense mass 
rather than to show off the charms of each 
individual subject. While this is so the 
cultivation of hardy plants will never be 
taken up so readily by would-be growers as 
would be the case if the flowers of each 
kind were more pleasingly and naturally set 
up. There appears to be an idea that the 
stems of many flowers, no matter what their 
height and characteristics may be, should 
be cut at about the same length, and in 
consequence visitors are completely at a 
loss to know what are the points of merit of 
the respective subjects. We sometimes 
find, also bunched together in a glorious 
mass of color, subjects which the well- 
informed know full well are somewhat un- 
attractive or meagre in their display in the 
hardy border, and which by their represen- 
tation at the shows are distinctly mislead- 
ing. There are so many excellent hardy 
flowers now in commerce that the indifferent 
things can easily be spared. The fault in 
exhibiting hardy flowers at shows generally 
lies in staging rather small bunches, tightly 
packed together, with stems altogether out 
of proportion to the subject exhibited. 
Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, M.P., 
greatly admires the effect of heather banks 
qn gardens, especially when as many sorts 
‘of Erica as possible are shown upon them. 
‘Madame Emma Hames is a great lover of 
pansies. = ee wei ealls 
