Farm and Garden.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 119, 26 July 1873, Page 9

Farm and Garden.

BEDDING-OUT.

It needs some courage to stand by the bedding-out system when it is ridiculed as vulgar and laughed at as absurd. Still it has vitality enough in it to stand firm against the shafts of ridicule, and to laugh with those who win, who will certainly be the bedders-out. It has a grasp upon the horticultural mind that can never be materially loosen'ed ; more, the greatest opponents of bedding-out also “ bed” themselves. It is not so much a change of style as a change of material that is advocated.' The tendency of the day is to mass, that is, to group or bed out plants; and this is a right and a true, as well as the most effective and natural, method of distributing them. The dotting style is the most artifical and least effective that could be adopted. Nature avoids units and runs into masses ; breadth is the basis of her magnificence, distictness the - grand secret of her beauty, ever fresh and ever new. Hence those who follow nature at her best, group, mass, bed out. Writers and practitioners who decry pelargoniums, with all their matchless tints of beauty, golden calceolarias, verbenas of all shades of colour, and other so-called bedding plants, nevertheless bed-out herbaceous phloxes, asters, golden rods, pentstemons, hollyhocks, pampas-grass, cannas, solanums, wigandias, and fine foliage plants, and succulents without number or end. Very well ! the more the better. But why should the greenist decry the , colorist ?—the lover of quaint or huge -foliage the lover of bright colored and beautiful flowers ? The love of color is not a vulgar taste. It is not only natural to man, but it is a proof of culture, and reveals a knowledge and a love of art as well as of nature. For nature is prodigal of color. The earth and the sky are richly variegated with different hues, and that first and best painter, the sun, dips his penoils of light in glory, and colors each leaf and flower with matchless beauty. Color is one of our richest heritages, and most pure and satisfying pleasures; and lest we should overlook it, nature has spread abroad masses of it by the mile—over earth and sky, that we might be impressed with its grandeur, and learn how to heighten its effects by massive breadths and startling contrasts, —in other words, beds out and uses color on a colossal and prodigal scale. As to those who decry color, I would pity rather than blame them. They lack the eye to discern, the taste to appreciate it. There are men, some say nations, who are color blind. They have no more perception of the richness and harmony of color, than those who have no ear for magic can appreciate or enjoy its seraphic harmonies. It is distraction to all such ; they cannot take it in, and therefore they deprecate it as useless, vulgar, rude, or -• barbarous. On the contrary, color is . divine—oneof the richest and most satisfying gifcs of the Creator to His creatures, j The beauties of earth, and the glories of , heaven, are alike painted with the most ’ exquisite colors. Nay, what would even , woman be without her teeth of pearl, her ; lips of rubies, her forehead of May bios-

Bom at its whitest, and her cheecks of roses ! Our gardens stripped of color en masse would be almost equally tame as a human faco of blanched white or jaundiced green. No; the flower garden is the place for color, and in many cases the masses can hardly be too bright or broad to relieve the dead weight of bricks and stone, and span or illuminate with rainbow brilliancy whole landscapes of green capped with the azure blue of the sky. We have no lack of neutral tints in our houses and our landscapes. The danger is rather in a preponderance of sombre hues, in an excess of coarseness and of greens, rather than too much brilliance. I had intended to add a few notes on the place for color ; but reserving this for another occasion, I would rather add a few sentences from the fifth chapter of the second volume of the “ Stones of Venice,” for I think all who have read Ruskin will admit that he is a great authority in Art. No one but must be willing to hear him. Here is what he says upon color :—“ The fact is, we none of us appreciate the nobleness and sacredness of color. Nothing is more common than to hear it spoken of as a subordinate beauty —nay, even as the mere source of a sensual pleasure ; and we might almost believe that we were daily among men who—- * Could strip for aught the prospect yields To them their verdure from the fields ; And take the radiance from the clouds With which the sun his setting shrouds.’ But it is not so. Such expressions are used for the most part in thoughtlessness, and if the speakers would only take the pains to imagine what the world and their own existence would become if the blue were taken from the sky, and the gold from the sunshine, and the verdure from the leaves [and I would add, the brightness from leaf and flower], and the crimson from the blood which is the life of man, the flush from the cheek, the darkness from the eye, the radiance from the hair —if they could but see for an instant white human creatures living in a white world, [green men in green gardens would be well-nigh as bad], they would soon feel what they owe to colour. The fact is, that of all God’s gifts to the sight of man, colour is the holliest, the most divine, the most solemn. We speak rashly of gay colours and sad colours, for colour cannot at once be good and gay ; all good colour is in some degree pensive, the loveliest is melancholy, and the purest and most thoughtful minds are those which love colour the most,” Further on Mr Ruskm, observes that the love of colour elevated the old painters. “ They hold on by it as by a chain let down from heaven with one hand, though they may sometimes gather dust and ashes with the other.” Some of the best pictures are simply pieces of jewellery, the colours of the draperies being perfectly pure, as various as those of a painted widow, chastened only by paleness and relieved upon a gold ground.” “ I know no law more severely without exception than this of the connection of pure colour with profound and noble thought. The early religious painting of the Flemings is as brilliant in hue as it is holy in thought. The builders of our great cathedrals veiled their casements and wrapped their pillars in one robe of purple splendour.” “ Nor does it seem difficult to discern a noble reason for this universal law. In that heavenly circle which binds the statutes of colour upon the front of the sky, when it became the sign of the convenant of peace, the pure lines of divided light were sanctified to the human heart for ever; nor is this, it would seem, by mere arbitrary appointment, but in consequence of the fore-ordained and marvellous constitution of those lines with a sevenfold, or, more strictly still, a threefold order typical of the Divine nature itself.” Mr Ruskin, goes on to add, “ It was not without meaning that the love of Israel for his chosen son was expressed by the coat of many colours ; not without deep sense of the sacredness of that symbol of purity did the lose daughter of David tear it from her breast. With such robes were the king’s daughters that were virgins apparelled. The Israelites by Divine command veiled the tabernacle with its train of purple and scarlet, while the under sunshine flashed through the fall of the colour from its tenons of. gold ; but it was less by such guidance that the Mede, as he struggled out of anarchy, encompassed the king with the sevenfold burning of the battlements of Ecbatana, of which one circle was golden like the sun, and another silver like the moon ; and then came the great sacred chord of colour —blue, purple, and scarlet; and then a circle white as day, and another dark like night; so that the city rose like a great mural rainbow, a sign of peace amid the contending of lawless races, and guarded with colour and shadow that seemed to symbolise the great order which rules our day and night, and Time —the first organisation of the mighty statutgs —the law of theMedes and Persians, that alfcereth not.” These sentence ought to silence those who affirm that the love of colour is a relic of barbarism fit for the childhood of

the race —a pleasure that we have outgrown as children do their love for dolls or toys. On the contrary, colour, and the love and use of it, are permanent, durable as the rocky foundations of the earth —as the sun in the heavens, the great source of it all, —even more so, for when both have passed away colour will abide. Neither is the love of colour inconsistent with admiration of form. On the contrary. “ the dust of gold and flame of jewels may be dashed, as sea spray, upon the majestic rock of thoughtful form,” to the greater beauty and higher glory of each. Mr Ruskin considers that there is nothing more necessary to the progress of European art at the present day than the complete understanding of the saneity of colour. It is unfortunate for the future of gardening art that a set has been made against it. Miss Maynard, in her “ Dream of Fair Colours,” thus sweetly expresses important truths, which deserve the most serious attention of all horticulturists : “ For still in every land, though to Thy name Arose no temple, —still in every age, Though heedless man had quite forgot Thy praise, We praised Thee ; and at rise and set of sun Did we assemble daily, and intone A choral hymn that all the lands might hear; In heaven, and earth, and in the deep we praised Thee, Singly, or mingled in sweet sisterhood. But now, acknowledged ministrants we come, Co-worshippers with men in this Thy house, We, the Seven Daughters of the Light, to praise Thee, Light of Light!—Thee, God of every Q-od !”# —D. T. Fish, in the “ Agricultural Gazette.” That veteran advocate of thin seeding as rational cultivation, the Rev. George Wilkins, has been asking Mr Mechi some awkward questions about the “ quack doctoring ” of seed grain with bluestone, which Mr Mechi says he uses for the prevention of rust, smut, and such like parasitic diseases. He wants to know, amongst other things, “ if bluestone and water will prevent fungi from infesting crops of cereals, why the seed of leguminous crops should not be doctored for the louse also, as these are merely the effect of the fungus being produced on peas and beans.” Speaking of headlands, which Mr Mechi said suffered from rust owing to the seed not having been dressed, Mr Wilkins makes the following sound practical remarks : —“ They are seldom or never cultivated as the rest of the fields are. They are also near ditches often full with stagnant water, and hedges and tress are generally in close proximity to the headlands, all rendering it almost impossible for them to produce anything but weakly and sickly crops ; and these are causes which produce the smut, red rust, mildew, &c., on all crops where these maladies exist—and they never do exist except where the land is not half cultivated, nor rationally seeded, and the growing crops have not a sufficiency of the proper pabiila to feed upon. In all such places the maladies which effect my friend’s and his brother farmers’ crops on their headlands are sure to appear, but nowhere else. *■ Mr H. Davis, though I believe he farmed nearly or quite 1000 acres, had neither smut on cereals nor louse on pulse, nor would any one who farmed as Mr Davis did.” Deep and thorough cultivation, combined with thin seeding, are Mr Wilkin’s cure for rust, smut, and all the other diseases to which plant life is liable, the conditions in short that will ensure perfect health. Two important sales of shorthorn cattle are reported, viz., the Townley herd and a draft from Lord Penrhyn’s Wicken Park herd, the latter being “of the bluest Bates blood.” The Townley herd, a “level lot compounded of various tribes,” realised the following average : £ s. d. £ a. d. 35 cows averaged 131 5 0 ... 4593 15 0 5 bulls „ 89 13 5 ... 448 7 0 40 head „ 126 1 0 ... 5042 12 0 The 6th Maid of Oxford was knocked down for the highest figure, 800 guineas; but dissatisfaction was expressed at the name of her purchaser not having been given. The cattle sold from Lord Penrhyn’s herd realised high average prices £ s. d. £ s. d. 31 cows averaged 223 12 4 ... 6932 2 0 10 bulls „ 170 18 9 ... 1709 8 0

41 head „ 210 15 4 ... 8641 10 0 The highest priced were Cherry Duchess 14th, 755 guineas ; Cherry Duchess 13th, 555 guineas ; Waterloo 30th, 500 guineas ; and Cherry Duchess 20th, calved on the sth of August in 1872, 505 guineas. Several purchases were made at these and other sales for the Australian colonies, and would be shipped before the two years’ prohibition came in force. Six out of the ten bulls sold at Lord Peurhyn’s sale were bought for Australia. Those desiring to construct a temporary or cheap fence for yarding fowls are referred to the following plan, which we copy from the “National Live Stock Journal” : —Procure scantling 14 or 16 feet in length and cut them into 7 or 8

! feet pieces, and set so that they will project above the ground five feet. On tbs top of them nail a strip of inch board 6 inches in width, and along the bottom close to the ground a strip of the same, and you have your framework complete. The laths should be put on with lath or shingle nails, and need only lap on the board at the bottom two inches. Next saw a bunch of laths in two and with strong jack-knife sharpen the end of each piece, after which extend your pickets above the top board by nailing on the sharpened pieces, allowing them to lap on the top board three inches. You have now a finished fence six feet nine inches in height. Of course this would not do where stock could rub against it ; but for town people who want a few fowls, and have to keep them confined it is just the thing. It is well known that leather articles, kept in stables, soon become brittle in consequence of ammoniacal exhalations, which affect both harness hanging up in such localities and the shoes of those who frequent them. The usual applications of grease are not always sufficient to meet this difficulty : but it is said that by adding to them a small quantity of glycerine the leather will be kept continually in a soft and pliable condition. Feeding Calves. —Baron Liebig recommends the following artificial milk : Seven pints of water and three and a half pints of milk are boiled with 10 ounces of wheat flour to an ordinary pap ; more pints of milk are added, with 1J ounce of a potash solution consisting of two parts of bicarbonate of potash dissolved in 11 parts of water. Tlie same quantity of bruised malt as of wheat flour is added to the hot pap, which is well stirred and allowed to settle for half an hour near the stove or other warm place, when it is boiled again and filtered through suitable gauze. The calves are fed for about six weeks on pure milk, and gradually they are allowed less, some of the substitute being added. At last they are given

about seven quarts of artificial milk per day as pure milk. About three months, only half this quantity is given, half a pound of linseed cake being added ; in the autumn some boiled potatoes are mixed in. On this food calves gain about 21bs weight per da'y. Should calves dislike the cow’s milk, the substitute may be given at once. No bad effects are produced. It is a cure for diarrhoea.

The Canterbury Provincial Government have gazetted the conditions under which a bonus of £2OOO will be granted for the manufacture of woollen goods in the province. They are as follows : —l. The woollen fabrics on account of which the bonus is claimed must be produced from a manufactory permanently established and working in the province of Canterbury, and not transferred from any other province. 2. The bonus will not be paid unless satisfactory proof is given of the production within a period of two years of marketable woollen fabrics to the value of not less than five thousand pounds. 3. Notice of the intention to claim the bonus must be given to the Provincial Secretary not later than December 31, 1873. 4. The bonus will be paid on the certificate of an officer appointed by the Provincial Government that the above conditions have been complied with. Mr W. B. Homer, the advocate of the Greenstone route to Martin’s Bay, is, we (“ Wakatip Mail”) believe, in communication with the Government as to the opening up of a road from the Greenstone Valley to Milford Sound. We gather that Mr Homer has discovered a practicable pass. If so, an immense public gain will be achieved —so great that we hardly dare sketch out in what it consists, lest disappointment should ensue upon failure. Mr Homer describes the country as magnificent. This is the region colored white on the map—the terra incognita of Dr Hector, who has two or three times attempted to penetrate ir from the seaboard, but without success. It is no doubt a piece of country rich in gold and mineral resources. We trust the news is true, though it is almost too good to believe. The premises of the £ 1 Miners’ Advocate” newspaper, at Newcastle, were burnt down recently. Type, manuscripts, and machinery were completely destroyed. The American “ Publishers’ Weekly” mentions quite a novelty in advertising, but the plan, we fancy, is hardly likely to gain favor with our English publishers. A pushing house on the other side of the Atlantic, being very desirous of extending the sale of a book they were bringing out, recently hit upon the expedient of distributing, gratis, cakes of soap, on which were imprinted an advertisement of the work they were so anxious to sell. Mr Froude is preparing a series of brilliant historical articles for ‘ £ Scribner’s Monthly,” the subject of which, we learn, is monastry life in England of the olden time. He will disclose what a great abbey of those days really was, with glances at what was going on in England meanwhile, and a sketch of i the Wat Tyler insurrection.