such a pit by temporary floorings, &c. For the management of cuttings, see pages 420 and 425 in "Doings of the Last Week." The distance from the glass lies in a nutshell. The nearer the glass the less danger of being drawn; but the greater danger of scorching if shading is not attended to. One foot is a good medium distance. At 2 feet they will feel the sun less, and will require less shading, and have, therefore, more light.]

REMOVING LARGE PEACH TREES.

I HAVE a cool vinery about 30 feet long, the back wall of which is about 11 feet high. To this wall I wish to remove some fine trained standard Peach trees, now growing alternately with some dwarf-trained trees. I find the latter are now quite sufficient to cover the wall without the standards. The trees were planted four years since, and now girt 5 inches, and cover an area of about 20 feet. Their growth has been quite satisfactory, and they have made the best of wood this year. The roof of the cool vinery, to the back wall of which I want to remove them, is quite capable of growing all the Grapes I require, without the addition of the wall which has hitherto been devoted to the growth of Grapes. My intention is to cut back two out of three of the leading Vine-rods as far as half way down the roof, so that there will be no great deficiency of sun to the Peach trees. Will you advise me how to go about the removal, so as reasonably to hope for success? Is there any root preparation necessary? I have enclosed a small portion of bark taken from one of my Pear trees, an Easter Beurré on the Quince stock. Several are similarly affected, the bark opening and looking very scaly. I am afraid if it progresses it will do considerable injury to their growth.

before we saw it, but on examining it and finding the alburnum all safe beneath the seemingly split bark, we do not think there is need of alarm as to the future-in fact, it seems that the tree has relieved itself of rather a stiff coat by bursting the outside layer, and distending the inner covering, and all for its own comfort.]

REMOVING DECAYED FLOWERS FROM

ROSES.

THE other day I was cutting some Roses from my standards, when, to my surprise, an amateur friend assured me that I was injuring my trees; that standards did not like to have their flowers removed. I had always thought as a rule that the remaining flowers bloomed all the stronger if some were removed; but as my friend's standards are always very superior to mine, I should be inclined at once to bow to his dictum if the gardening world had not at all times so high an authority as yourself to fly to, sure of an obliging opinion upon any point of doubt or difficulty.-H. A.

[Your friend has a wrong idea altogether about Rose trees; the more Roses you take from a tree or bush Rose, and the sooner you do it after they are fit to gather, the better it is for the future health of the tree. If the strength of Rose trees was the object in growing them, no Roses should be left on them at all. Tell your friend what is here written, and tell him to mind it in future with his own Roses, and mark the difference, you will thus bring him over to the truth.]

[Your Peach trees on the back wall of the vinery will answer just in proportion to the light and air you can give them. if the roof should be densely clothed with Vines, the Peaches will not be worth eating, and after a year or two you will not get any to eat. If there are from 4 feet to 6 feet and onwards between the bearing-stems of Vines, that will admit a good degree of light to the north wall, and the Peaches will do well if kept cool enough until they are fairly set. It is too late to think of preparing Peach trees for removal now, except so far as keeping the head of the tree well regulated and free from all laterals, and the shoots shortened in a little to growing buds. This will so far husband the resources of the root, and cause the buds to plump and the wood to ripen, whilst as yet the leaves are nice and green. We presume the back of the Vinery-border contains fairish soil. We would have a little sandy loam and fine leaf mould ready to go immediately over the roots to encourage fresh rooting. Then from the middle to the third week of October we would commence taking up the Peach trees, taking them up carefully, beginning at the extremities and forking so as to disentangle the fibres, and wrapping them in damp cloths as we proceeded, unless the weather was shady and moist. We would then try and undermine the tree so as to get a ball with it if possible; but if we could not get much of that, we would be very particular in getting every root and taking care that the fibres should not be dried. In planting, be careful that the tree stands as high as it did before-in other words be sure that the stem is not buried lower than it was previously. To allow for sinking, the collar of the plant should be from 4 inches to 6 inches higher than you ultimately wish it to be. Then spread out the roots nicely, and damp them slightly through the rose of a watering-pot. Then proceed and pack them nicely in layers with the sandy loam and leaf mould. When all well covered give a good watering with water at about 80°, and when settled replace the surface soil. Syringe the leaves at the same time, as the longer they keep on so as to induce quick root action the better. If the sun shines brightly, not only syringe the leaves, but shade, but give no more shade than will keep the leaves from flagging. With such treatment the leaves will drop some time in November, and fresh roots will be making. To encourage them cover the ground with litter or tan during the winter, so as to keep the heat of the ground from radiating off; and if you keep your house airy and cool in spring as the buds swell, there will be plenty of root action to support them, and a good crop will be obtained. The success will, however, greatly depend in attending

to these minutiæ.

The piece from the Pear trees was rather too much dried

ON AN EAST AND ANOTHER ON A SOUTH WALL. I HAVE two Honeysuckles, planted about six years ago, against my house by the drawing-room window-one facing the south, the other round the corner facing the east. Both are planted under the projecting eaves running round the house, and the roots are consequently generally dry. The one to the east is planted on the lawn, that on the south front is in a narrow border, and their roots are within a few feet of each other. Both plants have grown vigorously, but the one at the east side is always a month later than the other. They are both always loaded with blossom; but the one facing the south is always attacked with insects soon after it begins to blossom, to such an extent that more than three-fourths of the blossoms never expand, but become a black mass of a glutinous consistency, which seem to defy all our attempts to get them clean. Syringing and washing are of no avail, and the surface is too large to attempt fumigation in the open air. The sister plant growing round the corner is never attacked with insects of any kind, but is as clean and healthy as can be desired: it does not, however, produce so many clusters of bloom in an equal space, but every one opens well. What can be the cause of the one on the south front being so dreadfully infested with aphides? Is it because the roots get too dry and hot? as that facing the east is more exposed to rain in the spring when easterly winds prevail, while the other is sheltered. Can anything be done to mitigate the evil?-R. C., Harlington.

[You have yourself suggested the evil and the remedy. When you prune the Honeysuckle in the autumn wash it well over with soap and water, and when dry paint it all over with clay paint, a quart of which had an ounce of flowers of sulphur mixed with it, and an ounce of shag tobacco steeped in the water that made the paint. Stir the soil, and give a good soaking of water as soon as the buds break. Repeat the operation several times during the summer if dry. A little rotten dung, or tan, or

cocoa-nut fibre on the surface would lessen the force of the sun

in drying the soil, and might be covered with earth to prevent its being unsightly.]

Now that at Kew and elsewhere this magnificent queen of aquatics has been and is in its superlative of beauty, we may appropriately place before our readers a full description of the

plant from the pen of the late Professor Henfrey, with some notes on its culture from the pen of Mr. Iveson, gardener at Syon House, published in the "Gardeners' Magazine of Botany." Nat. ord., Nymphaeaceae, § Euryales.

GENERIC CHARACTER.- Victoria, Lindley. Tube of the calyx sub-globose, adherent to the ovary, expanded into a torus at the throat; limb 4-parted, deciduous, coloured. Petals numerous, inserted on the throat and torus of the calyx; outer ones at length completely reflexed, longer than the calyx, the interior by degrees narrower, acuminate, rigid, approaching the form of the stamens. Stamens numerous, inserted with the petals on the torus in about three rows, fertile; the filaments subulate, petaloid, but rigid and firm, at length erect; anthers introrse, the cells situated below the apex, linear-elongate, adnate. Within the stamens the torus is prolonged upwards and inwards for about an inch, arching over in wards; on its margin is borne a circle of conical, fleshy, somewhat recurved, horn-like processes. Ovary globose below, concave-campanulate at the top, marked with rays setting out from a central beak, many-celled, the cells at first arranged regularly in one circle, afterwards becoming irregular by mutual pressure, with many ovules; ovules anatropous, parietal, affixed to a spongy, reticulated placenta by short funiculi; styles wanting, connate into a furrowed bell clothing the tube of the calyx (Lindley); stigmas forming radiating lines on the top of the ovary (R. Brown). There exist also about thirty large, fleshy, incurved, somewhat scroll-shaped bodies, forming projecting ridges at the outer ends of the rays of the top of the ovary, their outer faces being blended with the concavity of the vaulted portion of the torus. These have been described as stigmas. Fruit baccate, globular-campanulate or cup-shaped, truncate, campanulate above, beaked in the centre, many-celled; cells many-seeded. Seeds oval-globular, with a horny testa, and copious albumen.

A vast aquatic herb, inhabiting still rivers in the north of South America, east of the Andes, rhizome perennial (?) Leaves gigantic, floating, orbiculate, peltate, flat, the margin elevated all round, radiately and retiIcularly ribbed, the ribs very prominent below, on very long foot-stalks, the vernation of the lamina corrugated-involute; flowers large and handsome, at first whitish, becoming rose, especially within, peduncles elongated; roots adventitious, breaking out below the insertion of the leaves on the rhizome; petioles, peduncles, calyx-tube, and the ribs of the leaves below, with abundant large and acute spines.

VICTORIA REGIA, Lindley. Victoria Water Lily.-The only species. SYNONYMY.-Victoria regia, Lindley; Monograph on Victoria (with plates), privately printed in 1837; Botanical Register Misc, 1838, p. 9; D'Orbigny, Ann. des Sc. Naturelles, 2nd ser. Botanique, vol. xiii., p. 57; Walpers, Repertorium, vol. i., p. 106; Schomburgk, Views in the Interior of Guiana, p. 2, frontispiece; Botanical Magazine, 3rd ser., vol. iii., 1847, p. 1, tab. 4275-4278.

Victoria regina, Gray, Mag. of Zool. and Botany, vol. ii., 1838, p. 440. Nymphæa Victoria, Schomburgk, M.S.

Euryale Amazonica Pöppig, Froriep's Notizen, vol. xxxv., p. 9; Reise, vol. ii., p. 432.

Victoria Cruziana, D'Orbigny, 1. c., p. 57 (leaves of the same colour on both sides, petals all rose-coloured).

DESCRIPTION.-A large aquatic herb, with a perennial rhizome large and tuberous, with internodes scarcely developed, furnished with numerous cylindrical adventitious roots abounding in air-cavities; the rhizome thick, of a brown colour externally, white within, changing to purple when cut (Schomburgk), decaying at the base as it developes leaves, flowers, and roots above, growing in 4-6 feet water. Petioles long, terete, clothed with copious prickles. Leaves floating, very large, 4 feet to 6 feet in diameter; when first expanded, oval with a deep narrow cleft at one end, almost exactly orbicular when full-grown, peltate, with the margin turned up all round, forming a rim like that of a teatray; the upper side of the blade full green, with numerous reticulations forming somewhat quadrangular areola; the under side deep purple, or, according to D'Orbigny, sometimes green, (brownish-red in the specimen from which our drawings were made), clothed with short, spongy pubescence, with very prominent flattened ribs set edgeways on the lamina, radiating from the petiole to the circumference, and progressively diminishing in depth; these are united by cross ribs, also vertical plates, and the latter again by less elevated ones crossing them, so that the under surface is completely divided into quadrangular chambers, of which the ribs form the sides, and the general surface of the lamina the top, and as these detain air within them, they act as floats; all the ribs are more or less beset with spines, varying in length, sharp and horny, enlarged at the base. Vernation of the lamina corrugated-involute-that is, the greater part wrinkled up like the petals of the Poppy, with the margin rolled in on all sides. Peduncles all axillary, from the rhizome, longer than the petiole (?), and rising above the surface of the water when the flower expands, terete, prickly, very copiously furnished with air-cavities, oneflowered. Flower 10 inches to 15 inches in diameter, somewhat pear-shaped in bud, fragrant. Calyx deeply 4-parted; the tube turbinate, green, very prickly, adherent to the ovary; the lobes of the limb large, oval, reddishpurple, concave, deciduous, a little prickly on the outside towards the base, rather shorter than the petals. Within, at the throat, the calyx enlarges into an annular torus bearing the petals and stamens. Petals very numerous, the outer ones larger than the calyx, oblong,

in the temperature kept up for the Victoria. Altogether, I hope to form a very beautiful, fragrant, and interesting group of tropical and other aquatics."

ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY.
AUGUST 27.

FLORAL COMMITTEE.-The majority of the flowers exhibited to-day were Dahlias and Hollyhocks, and again the florists had it pretty well to themselves. The heat of the day was intense, and the great Reading Flower Show coming off on the morrow, may have, probably, deterred some exhibitors; but there was not, certainly, a very large display. The gardens looked very nice; but who can calculate the cost at which this is attained? On one of the parterres were five men at work, and another superintending, the men being armed with a pair of scissors each! to cut off dead leaves, dying blooms, and straggling shoots. Surely this is bedding-out run mad, and that at a time of the year when not a soul-i. e., of the beau monde is in London, when Rotten Row and Kensington Gardens cannot boast a single horseman or horsewoman, and to be seen in the parks is as one of the deadly sins. Well, well, "soon come, soon gone is the old adage; and if you want a good recipe how to get rid of a redundancy of cash, I say go to the Well, I must not be personal-but to that Society which has always been famous for its feats in that line. But I must get back to the Committee.

Mr. Bull exhibited the following plants, Sonerila elegans, Xanthosoma maculata, an Arum-like plant with a pretty bloom on the stalk, and the margin of the leaves white; Pollia purpurea, with very deep metallic lustre on the leaves, almost as if a careful housewife had blackleaded it-a Label of Commendation was given to this; Maranta orbifolia, Phyllagatha rotundifolia, and Azalea Duncani.

Mr. Chater, of Saffron Walden, exhibited a collection of Hollyhocks, amongst which were Premier; Lady King, a crimson flower, for which a Label of Commendation was awarded; Grandissima, Lady Paxton, Bianca, Ne Plus Ultra, a fine lilac purple flower-for this a Label of Commendation was awarded; Queen Victoria; La Reine Blanche, Carminata, Countess Russell, soft, pink, fine guard petal and very full flower-to this a Firstclass Certificate was given; Triumphans, Glory of Walden, Shotgrove Perfection, Agenora, and Invincible, a fine salmon rose-this also received a First-class Certificate.

Certificate, as did Penstemon Lobbianum, collected by Mr.W.Lobb in California, a small, shrubby-looking plant, with yellow flowers and sweet acented. Its locality indicates hardiness, and if so it will be a great addition to our hardy plants. Also Pentstemon spectabilis from the same country, no improvement on existing kinds closely allied to it; and Pollia purpurea from Java, the same as exhibited by Mr. Bull, and receiving the same awarda Label of Commendation. They also had an unknown Orchid from Ceylon, of no apparent merit.

Mr. Richardson, of East Sheen, sent Geranium Portobello, inferior to many at present in growth. A seedling Allamanda was also exhibited, but inferior to cathartica.

From Messre. Charlwood & Cummins came some very large blooms of Helianthus californicus; and from Messrs. E. G. Henderson & Co., several Variegated Geraniums, Mrs. Pollock, Sunset, Delicata, and Aureum bicolor; the first very striking in foliage, green, with a broad belt of dark red crimson, and externally belted with yellow. The second received a Label of Commendation, its habit seemingly not so robust as Mrs. Pollock. The third was a neat-habited white-variegated flower with pink bloom, and was considered worthy of a Label of Commendation. As pot plants these tricolor-zoned Geraniums are very pretty, but they hardly keep their character out of doors, many which gave bright promise having grievously disappointed afterwards. Wherever they can have a little protection, they are very showy and beautiful.-D., Deal.

MR. MARCH'S DESIGN FOR TABLE
DECORATION.

WITH your permission I will make a few remarks in reply to a letter in your last Number, signed "J. R.," upon the subject of the flower-glasses made to my design for the June Exhibition at Kensington, and by the aid of which I had the good fortune to gain the first prize for table decoration. The decision of the Jury and the approval of the press have failed to satisfy your correspondent in the face of certain practical difficulties which he conceives to exist, but which I will undertake to prove are imaginary.

From Mr. Charles Turner, of Slough, and Mr. John Keynes, of Salisbury, came a large number of Dahlias, some of which had been exhibited before, others now for the first. By the former gentleman were exhibited, Cygnet, a light lilac flower of good properties; Una, Charlotte Dorling, a shaded purple of attractive character, to which a Label of Commendation was given; Captain Harvey and John Spencer.

Mr. Keynes had Fair Maid of Bath, a light tipped flower, much in the way of Caroline, very delicate and pretty-a Label of Commendation was given to it; Tiffany; Prince Arthur; Imperial, a large, well-built amaranth purple, of fine properties this, too, received a Label of Commendation; it was an exceedingly fine flower; Fanny Purchase; Oscar; Goldfinder, a large, yellow tipped flower, perhaps too coarse; Royal Purple, and Maria Carter, white, tipped with deep carmine-this received a Label of Commendation, not for its first-rate properties as a florists' flower, but for its very attractive colour.

On the whole it seemed to me that the advance this year in Dahlias is as yet not very great; but it is far too early to judge, and doubtless the 11th will produce some fine blooms.

From Messrs. Low & Son came some very interesting things. Anoectochilus Bulleni, from Borneo, a beautiful species of what the Cingalese call the King of the Woods, from the intense beauty of its markings. A note accompanied it to say that a week ago it was on board the Delta, showing how admirably it had been forwarded: for this a First-class Certificate was awarded. Also Arthrobotrya articulata, a very beautiful stove Fern from the same country. This also received a First-class

He remarks that an object to be really beautiful must also be useful. So said Burke in his famous essay on the "Sublime and Beautiful;" and on this ground we will argue this question, though I cannot concede the ground so far as to agree with the retired citizen, who objected to the Russian service because he "liked to see his vittles." In the name of utility "J. R." brings forward two objections to the "prize design," that it is too brittle for wear, and that it obstructs the view and conexhibited in June were made up in a temporary manner from such materials as were at hand, and it is true that the glass stems then used were too slender for use and ill adapted for "locomotion." Messrs. Dobson & Pearce, of 19, St. James' Street, have since carried out the design in a practical way, and to my mind the glass stems have lost none of their elegance by being made stronger-so strong that nothing short of an Irish row or a drunken servant should break them, certainly not the vibration or "table rapping" at the most uproarious of public feasts. The pieces also are fitted separately, so that the glasses can be moved and packed with the greatest care.

The second objection raised is, that the flowers when arranged will obstruct free view and conversation at the dinner-table. It was really to obviate this very usual defect in epergnes and table decorations that I ventured to make the innovation. Most of these are handsome pieces of plate two stories high. Cupids and scroll-work lead to the first floor, where there are branches for lights, or certain receptacles for fruit and bonbons. On the attic floor there is usually a glass in which the butler marshals his cut flowers, or inserts a sponge-cake tastefully fluted, and decorated for the sacrifice with floral attributes. Next to the centre ornament are generally silver branches for lights, and then two well-grown Fuchsias or Geraniums in silver wine-coolers: this is a very common arrangement at a London dinner party, and the plants and fruit-receptacles do materially interfere with the line of vision. A friend of mine will insist that the true use of the old epergne is to hide the ugly people opposite; but I will take a more cheerful view and assume that every one at the party is worth seeing and hearing. Well, the flower-glasses in question, which are chiefly made for dinner parties, are 24 inches high, reckoning from the