598 
JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER. 
Decpinber  26,  189». 
-  Clematis  paniculata. — A  transatlantic  contemporary  says 
that  this  has  come  to  be  recognised  as  one  of  the  very  best  of  ornamental 
climbers  when  in  flower,  but  it  is  worth  noting  that  the  grey  feathery 
tails  of  its  red  fruit  are  very  interesting  at  this  season,  while  the  late 
persisting  leaves  turn  to  rich  bronze  and  chocolate  colours. 
-  Berlin  Industrial  Exhibition,  1896.— We  are  informed 
that  horticulture  is  to  be  one  of  the  special  features  of  this  exhibition.  A 
large  tract  of  land  is  set  apart  for  the  sole  purpose,  and  the  arrangements 
are  entrusted  to  Herr  L.  Spath.  Some  eighty  Arms  in  Berlin  and 
environs  will,  it  is  said,  be  represented.  A  park  of  1900  square  metres 
has  also  been  arranged,  a  portion  of  which  will  be  devoted  to  landscape 
gardens,  while  flower  and  fruit  culture  will  be  represented. 
-  Begonia  Saundersi. — According  to  an  American  contem¬ 
porary  none  of  the  shrubby  Begonias  surpasses  this  species  in  grace  of 
form.  It  is  tall,  with  slender  stems  and  obliquely  cordate  leaves  of  a 
deep  glossy  green  on  slender  petioles  an  inch  long.  The  flowers  are  borne 
in  immense  cymes  on  very  long  and  slender  peduncles  from  the  axils  of 
the  upper  leaves.  Male  and  female  flowers  are  produced  on  separate 
cymes.  The  former  have  six  petals,  almost  obovate  in  outline,  half  an 
inch  or  more  in  length  ;  the  male  flowers  have  only  four  petals  and  are 
rather  smaller.  The  colour  is  a  very  bright  rose,  and  the  effect  of  a  good 
specimen  in  full  flower  is  exceedingly  pleasing.  It  flowers  late  in  the 
summer  and  continues  in  bloom  during  autumn  and  early  winter, 
-  Cold  Storage  for  Apples. — Anent  the  recent  progress  in 
the  matter  of  prolonging  the  season  of  fruits  by  means  of  cold  storage. 
Prof.  Craig,  of  the  Experiment  Farm  at  Ottawa,  Canada,  thinks  that 
the  time  may  soon  come  when  winter  Apples  may  not  be  a  necessity, 
as  autumn  Apples  can  be  kept  in  perfect  condition  until  the  next 
summer.  This  is  entirely  practicable,  but  as  winter  Apples  are  quite 
as  easily  grown  as  summer  or  autumn  Apples,  there  seems  no  need  of 
dispensing  with  either.  At  the  Columbian  Exposition,  in  the  New 
York  fruit  exhibit,  there  were  shown  at  the  opening  of  the  exhibition, 
and  for  some  weeks  after,  perfect  specimens  of  the  Sweet  Bough,  Sour 
Bough,  Fall  Pippin,  Pound  Sweet,  and  others,  and  they  kept  as  long 
after  being  removed  from  the  cold  storage  as  they  would  have  kept  in 
the  summer  or  autumn  without  having  been  thus  stored  ;  in  other 
words,  contrary  to  the  generally  acceptel  idea,  the  cold  storage  in  no 
way  impaired  their  keeping  qualities.  It  would  certainly  be  very 
pleasant  to  be  able  to  have  a  supply  of  Primate,  Chenango  Strawberry, 
Gravenstein,  and  Fall  Pippin  through  the  winter.  The  problem  to 
solve  is  to  make  central  cold  storage  plants  in  fruit-growing  neighbour¬ 
hoods,  where  business  enough  can  be  secured  to  make  them  profltable, 
operated  by  the  ammonia  process.  Ice  methods  will  not  answer.  To 
fill  the  modern  demand  they  must  be  able  to  freeze  fresh  meats,  fish, 
and  poultry  in  one  room,  while  keeping  fruit  at  30°  Fahrenheit  in 
another. — (“  American  Agriculturist.”) 
- Walnut  Cultivation  in  France.  —  This  industry  has, 
according  to  a  contemporary,  advanced  considerably  during  recent 
years,  as  the  Walnut  is  a  good  fruit  for  commerce,  as  it  keeps  well,  is 
easily  managed,  carries  well.  In  1885  France  proluced  1,590,182  cwts. 
of  Walnuts,  representing  a  value  of  25,028,462  francs  after  deducting 
commissions.  The  Drome  Department  occupies  the  first  place,  and  then 
come  those  of  Cori5ze  and  Lot.  Is^re  and  Dordogne  might  also  be 
named  as  producing  nuts  valued  at  33  francs  and  20  francs  per  cwt., 
whilst  the  three  more  productive  departments  are  classed  at  10  francs, 
13  francs  30  cents.,  and  17  francs  per  cwt.  In  1880  the  Ganceline 
station  forwarded  100,000  kilos,  of  nuts.  In  the  valley  of  Isere,  around 
Saint-Marcellin  (said  M.  Charles  Baltet  in  his  lecture  before  the  R.H.S.), 
you  may  see  trees  bearing  5  to  8  hectolitres  of  Walnuts,  selling  at 
20  francs  per  hectolitre.  But  even  by  averaging  the  produce  at  only 
50  francs  per  tree  there  is  still  a  good  profit,  there  being  here  no  expenses 
of  cultivation  to  consider.  This  neighbourhood  is  one  of  the  richest  in 
Walnut  trees,  yielding  annually  30,000  hectolitres  of  the  Mayette  and 
50,000  of  the  Chaberte  varieties,  the  first  named  being  sold  at  15  francs 
per  hectolitre  for  direct  consumption,  and  the  latter  to  the  oil  manufac¬ 
tories  at  3  francs.  The  gathering  costs  about  1  franc  per  hectolitre. 
The  Vinay  and  Tullins  cantons  export  the  Mayette  variety  to  St.  Peters- 
burg  to  the  number  of  2,000,000  nuts.  The  proprietors  in  these  cantons 
make  2000  francs  by  their  Walnut  trees.  The  fruit  is  sent  to  Marseilles 
on  willow  rafts,  which  are  floated  down  the  Rhone,  the  whole,  both  raft 
and  fruit,  being  sold  upon  landing.  Everywhere  the  Walnuts  from 
Is^re  are  the  best  in  the  market.  They  are  sometimes  called  by  the 
local  name  “  Archiduchesse.”  The  1885  crop  was  estimated  at  2,000,000 
francs. 
-  The  Flowering  Dogwood.— Very  rarely  does  the  Flowering 
Dogwood  develop  such  an  abundance  of  fruit  as  it  has  this  year  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  New  York.  In  Central  Park,  and  more  especially 
in  the  wild  woods  in  the  upper  end  of  Manhattan  Island,  where  these 
trees  are  abundant,  the  bright  scarlet  berries — three  or  four  of  them 
together  at  the  extremity  of  every  branchlet — make  them  the  most 
conspicuous  feature  in  the  foreground  of  every  landscape. 
-  Wasps  by  Rail. — A  correspondent  writes  to  “  Nature,” — “  On 
November  19th  of  this  year  some  yardsmen  were  turning  over  some 
English  Oak  planks,  prior  to  stacking  them,  at  Exeter,  when  one  of  the 
men  put  his  hand  in  a  knot-hole  that  occurred  in  a  6-inch  thick  plank. 
He  instantly  withdrew  it  with  a  cry,  and  some  wasps  flew  out.  On 
examination  the  hole  was  found  to  contain  a  large  nest  with  sixty  or 
seventy  wasps  in  it.  The  plank  and  its  living  contents  had  come,  with 
a  number  of  others,  from  Lincolnshire  by  rail  a  few  days  before. 
Probably  this  long  ride  for  a  wasps’  nest  beats  the  record  1  ” 
-  Rhamnus  hybrida. — In  the  botanic  garden  at  Vienna  there 
has  been  for  many  years  a  Buckthorn  shrub  named  Rhamnus  hybrida 
which  sprang  from  a  cross  between  R.  alpina  and  R.  alaternus.  One 
of  the  parent  species,  R.  alpina,  has  deciduous  leaves,  which  are  green 
in  the  summer  and  wither  and  drop  in  the  autumn.  The  other  has 
evergreen  leave*,  which  last  through  the  winter  and  remain  on  the 
branches  for  two  years.  The  hybrid,  gays  a  contemporary,  possesses 
leaves  which  do  not  fall  off  in  the  autumn,  nor  do  they  last  fresh  and 
green  for  two  years,  but  they  maintain  their  verdure  through  one  winter 
and  fall  in  the  spring  when  the  new  shoots  are  sprouting  from  the  buds. 
-  The  Editor  op  the  “  Garden  and  Forest.”  —  We 
learn  from  “  American  Gardening  ”  that  Mr.  W.  A.  Stiles, 
editor  of  “  Garden  and  Forest,”  has  been  appointed  one  of  the 
Commissioners  of  Parks  in  the  city  of  New  York  for  five  years.  This  is 
a  happy  selection,  and  made  because  of  the  man’s  fitness  for  the  position, 
and  entirely  beyond  the  pale  of  politics.  Mr.  Stiles  is  a  gentleman  of 
practical  and  refined  horticultural  taste,  and  he  has  always  been  deeply 
interested  in  the  preservation  and  improvement  of  our  parks  and  in 
making  them  attractive  to  the  multitude  without  in  the  least  degree 
infringing  upon  their  artistic  landscape  effect  and  beauty.  Just  now, 
when  the  Botanical  Garden  is  under  weigh,  and  a  large  acreage  of  new 
park  grounds  has  to  be  designed  and  improved,  to  have  men  of  the 
efficiency  and  calibre  of  Mr.  Stiles  at  the  head  of  the  Park  Department 
is  a  credit  and  an  honour  to  the  city  of  New  York. 
PRESENTATION  TO  MR.  WILLIAM  SHERWOOD. 
One  of  the  most  pleasant  gatherings,  illustrative  of  the  happy 
relationship  existing  between  the  head  of  a  great  firm  and  the  nearly 
300  workers  in  it,  that  we  have  witnessed  for  a  long  time  appropriately 
assembled  on  the  eve  of  Christmas  in  the  grand  banqueting  hall,  or  Royal 
Venetian  Chamber  of  the  Holborn  Restaurant  on  Saturday  evening  last. 
The  occasion  was  a  dinner  given  by  Mr.  N.  N.  Sherwood,  head  of  the 
great  wholesale  seed  house  of  Messrs.  Hurst  &  Son,  Houndsditch,  to  the 
staff  of  the  firm  and  friends,  to  celebrate  the  majority  of  his  son,  Mr. 
William  Sherwood.  The  whole  of  the  persons  employed  could  not 
attend,  for  over  150  of  them  may  be  indicated  by  a  slip  of  the  tongue  of 
one  of  the  speakers,  who  had  presumably  been  accustomed  to  address 
mixed  audiences,  and  who  evoked  a  ripple  of  laughter  by  addressing  the 
audience  as  “  ladies  and  gentlemen.”  There  were  no  ladies  present,  but 
120  of  the  sterner  sex  ;  and  it  may  be  safely  said  that  all  were  satisfied 
equally  with  the  sumptuous  repast  and  the  splendid  evidence  of  goodwill 
that  abounded  between  the  founder  of  the  feast  and  those,  old  and 
young,  who  worked  heartily  in  co-operation  with  him  in  carrying  out 
the  world-wide  business  of  which  they  have  reason  to  be  proud. 
Mr.  N.  N.  Sherwood  presided,  and  received  an  ovation,  testifying  to 
the  esteem  in  which  he  is  held  by  those  who  are  in  the  closest  connection 
with  him,  and  who  know  him  the  best ;  and  his  references  to  them  were 
couched  in  the  kindest  possible  terms  as  sincere  as  they  were  just  and 
appreciated. 
An  event  of  the  evening — indeed,  the  chief  event — was  the  presenta¬ 
tion  to  Mr.  William  Sherwood  of  a  valuable  and  completely  equipped 
travelling  case,  to  which  every  worker  in  the  firm  had  promptly  con¬ 
tributed.  It  was  chosen  as  being  at  once  useful  for  his  projected 
journeyings  in  distant  lands,  and  as  at  the  same  time  likely  to  link  him 
in  thought  with  the  old  and  young  folk  at  home.  The  presentation  was 
jointly  made  by  Mr.  Johnson,  who  had  been  fifty  years  in  the  firm,  and 
another  old  head  of  a  department.  It  was  accepted  by  the  recipient  in 
graceful  terms,  who  assured  his  hearers,  amidst  loud  plaudits,  that  it 
was  his  great  desire  to  follow  in  the  footsteps  of  his  father,  and  take  his 
example  as  his  rule  of  conduct  in  life.  Socially  and  intellectually, 
musically  and  oratorically,  the  proceedings  were  alike  succesiful  and 
enjoyable,  but  having  to  prepare  for  press  two  days  before  the  usual 
,  time  we  have  to  be  reluctantly  content  (or  otherwise)  with  this  brief 
f  reference. 
