About Orchids | Page 2

more varied and disastrous experience, to see the omissions of the text-books. They are written for the initiated, though designed for the amateur. Naturally it is so. A man who has been brought up to business can hardly resume the utter ignorance of the neophyte. Unconsciously he will take a certain degree of knowledge for granted, and he will neglect to enforce those elementary principles which are most important of all. Nor is the writer of a gardening book accustomed, as a rule, to marshal his facts in due order, to keep proportion, to assure himself that his directions will be exactly understood by those who know nothing.
The brief hints in "Reichenbachia" are admirable, but one does not cheerfully refer to an authority in folio. Messrs. Veitch's "Manual of Orchidaceous Plants" is a model of lucidity and a mine of information. Repeated editions of Messrs. B.S. Williams' "Orchid Growers' Manual" have proved its merit, and, upon the whole, I have no hesitation in declaring that this is the most useful work which has come under my notice. But they are all adapted for those who have passed the elementary stage.
Thus, if I have introduced few remarks on culture, it is not because I think them needless. The reason may be frankly confessed. I am not sure that my time would be duly paid. If this little book should reach a second edition, I will resume once more the ignorance that was mine eight years ago, and as a fellow-novice tell the unskilled amateur how to grow orchids.
FREDERICK BOYLE.
North Lodge, Addiscombe, 1893.

ABOUT ORCHIDS.

MY GARDENING.
I.
The contents of my Bungalow gave material for some "Legends" which perhaps are not yet universally forgotten. I have added few curiosities to the list since that work was published. My days of travel seem to be over; but in quitting that happiest way of life--not willingly--I have had the luck to find another occupation not less interesting, and better suited to grey hairs and stiffened limbs. This volume deals with the appurtenances of my Bungalow, as one may say--the orchid-houses. But a man who has almost forgotten what little knowledge he gathered in youth about English plants does not readily turn to that higher branch of horticulture. More ignorant even than others, he will cherish all the superstitions and illusions which environ the orchid family. Enlightenment is a slow process, and he will make many experiences before perceiving his true bent. How I came to grow orchids will be told in this first article.
The ground at my disposal is a quarter of an acre. From that tiny area deduct the space occupied by my house, and it will be seen that myriads of good people dwelling in the suburbs, whose garden, to put it courteously, is not sung by poets, have as much land as I. The aspect is due north--a grave disadvantage. Upon that side, from the house-wall to the fence, I have forty-five feet, on the east fifty feet, on the south sixty feet, on the west a mere ruelle. Almost every one who works out these figures will laugh, and the remainder sneer. Here's a garden to write about! That area might do for a tennis-court or for a general meeting of Mr. Frederic Harrison's persuasion. You might kennel a pack of hounds there, or beat a carpet, or assemble those members of the cultured class who admire Mr. Gladstone. But grow flowers--roses--to cut by the basketful, fruit to make jam for a jam-eating household the year round, mushrooms, tomatoes, water-lilies, orchids; those Indian jugglers who bring a mango-tree to perfection on your verandah in twenty minutes might be able to do it, but not a consistent Christian. Nevertheless I affirm that I have done all these things, and I shall even venture to make other demands upon the public credulity.
When I first surveyed my garden sixteen years ago, a big Cupressus stood before the front door, in a vast round bed one half of which would yield no flowers at all, and the other half only spindlings. This was encircled by a carriage-drive! A close row of limes, supported by more Cupressus, overhung the palings all round; a dense little shrubbery hid the back door; a weeping-ash, already tall and handsome, stood to eastward. Curiously green and snug was the scene under these conditions, rather like a forest glade; but if the space available be considered and allowance be made for the shadow of all those trees, any tiro can calculate the room left for grass and flowers--and the miserable appearance of both. Beyond that dense little shrubbery the soil was occupied with potatoes mostly, and a big enclosure for hens.
First I dug up the fine Cupressus. They told me such a big tree could not possibly "move;" but it did, and it