Fruit.
We know of a lady living in a cathedral town in the South of England who has three Peach-trees (two Alexandra Noblesse and one Sea-Eagle), from which she gets more fruit than many of her neighbours who own big gardens. Even in the suburbs of London fruit ripens well, provided it is grown properly. The best Walnuts we ever ate were grown in a Surbiton garden. In the midst of a grimy city we advise you not to try fruit, as we know of no kind that would be healthy; but if you are in a country town or suburb or in the country itself, if you have a brick wall with a south aspect, and if you live in the Midlands or in some other warm corner of England, you should certainly have a tree of your favourite fruit. It is most important to get it from a first-rate grower, to prepare the ground properly, and to plant it well. November is the proper month for planting. You must get someone to dig a large hole at least two feet deep, and put in plenty of manure for the roots to find when they grow down. If your tree is to be against a wall, put the main stem up against it before you begin, and then spread out the roots carefully in the shape of a fan. Any that are growing straight down must be cut off. Those that remain will be on different levels, so you must arrange the lower ones first, and put soil amongst them, then the next, and so on, till they are all comfortably spread out and covered. The hole in which you plant a tree should be rather bigger than its roots when spread out, and about a foot deep. When finished, the uppermost roots should be four inches below the soil. If you are going to grow it as a tree, and not against a wall, you must tie it to a strong stake directly it is planted. In this case you must take care that the rope you use does not chafe the bark. A short length of old hose-pipe or a band of hay is usually put between the rope and the tree where they touch each other. If the tree is to be trained against a wall, you must first cut off all damaged or broken branches, and then spread out those that remain in the shape of a fan. For this purpose you will want some little bits of cloth, a hammer and nails. Before you do it you should look at some well-trained fruit-trees carefully, and try to find out how they are done. But if you can possibly get a skilful gardener to plant your tree for you, we strongly advise you to do so, as a newly-planted fruit-tree should be cut back more or less, according to its variety and vigour. Pruning is also an operation that requires more skill and knowledge than any child can be expected to acquire. It should be done for you by the grown-up gardener. For a year or two a young tree will not require much pruning, and will not bear much fruit. If much fruit sets it should be picked off at once, or it will weaken the tree. All shoots from the roots should be cut off at once with a sharp knife.
If your wall is covered with climbing flowers, so that you have no room against it for a Peach, a Pear, a Plum, or a Cherry, you might find a corner for a Gooseberry bush, or a Red or White Currant. In the North of England you must put your Gooseberry or your Currant in the sunniest corner you can find, or the fruit will not ripen. In the South a little shade and moisture will suit it better. Gooseberries and Currants will prosper in any ordinary good garden soil, but the places for them should be well dug and dressed with manure some time before planting. They must not be put in too deeply, or the roots will send up suckers. October is a good month to plant.
A WINDOW GARDEN.
Red Champagne, Yellow Champagne, Red Warrington, and Early Sulphur, are good Gooseberries; Raby Castle and Comet are good Red Currants; White Dutch is the best White Currant.
Gooseberries and Currants are liable to be attacked by caterpillars in May, and these will eat all the leaves and destroy your crops if not removed. Hand-picking is the best way. You can also first syringe with soft water in which you have put a little soap, and then dust with a mixture of dry soot and lime. This will look ugly for a time, but rain soon washes it away.
Both Gooseberries and Currants require careful pruning in the autumn. The main branches should be shortened to six inches, and the side shoots to two or three buds. You always cut just above a bud, upwards and slantwise. You begin on the opposite side from the bud, and end cleanly just above it. Always choose a bud that means to grow out from the tree, and not inwards.
CHAPTER XIV
WINDOW, ROOM, AND JAPANESE GARDENS
If you are fond of flowers, and cannot have even a small garden, perhaps you can have a window-box, or some plants in pots or bulbs in glasses. A window garden should face south, east, or west, so that it gets plenty of sun. If you are obliged to have a north window you must grow plants that do not need much sun, such as Creeping Jenny, Musk, Golden Privet, Euonymus, Crocuses, Snowdrops, and hardy Ferns. Have your window-box made as long and as wide as the window-ledge will allow, and see that there are several holes bored in the bottom to allow waste water to run away. There must then be a layer of broken pots for drainage. The earth with which you now fill the box must be the very best you can obtain—if possible, a mixture of good loam, leaf-mould, and sand. In front you should put plants that will hang down, such as Petunias, Nasturtiums, Convolvulus, Carnations, Canariensis, Musk, or the Ivy-leaved Geraniums. The Giant Nasturtium and Convolvulus and Canariensis can all be grown from seed sown early in May, and they can either hang or climb upwards round strings or wires put for them from an upper window to your box. You must, of course, study the colours of the plants you grow in this way, and not choose Petunias and Nasturtiums in one season. Alternate pink Petunias and pink Ivy-leaved Geraniums would look well hanging down. Behind them you could have a row of pink Geraniums standing up, and behind these a row of white Marguerite Daisies. Another pretty combination would be Creeping Jenny to hang down, then Heliotrope, and then yellow Marguerite Daisy. In London the Heliotrope might be a little uncertain, as it likes pure air, but Calceolarias should thrive if properly treated, or mauve Violas. A box filled with healthy plants in the first week of May should flower till late in September.
You must never let your window-box get quite dry, and never water your plants when the sun is on them. Give a good soak (not a sprinkle) every evening after sunset. All faded flowers and dead leaves should be carefully cut off, and a little Clay’s Fertilizer—a teaspoonful to half a gallon of water—given once a fortnight.
In the autumn, when your summer flowers are over, remove them, roots and all, and turn over the soil well with a hand-fork. If you can add some fresh soil, so much the better. Then fill your box with bulbs for the spring. You might put Snowdrops, or Crocuses, or Siberian Squills in front, and then Daffodils of medium height, such as Princess Victoria, Sir Watkin, or Golden Spur. The back of the box can either be filled with small evergreen shrubs or with late Daffodils, such as Emperor or Empress, or with Hyacinths and Tulips. A box filled entirely with Tulips will make a splendid show for three weeks. When a hard frost comes, or rather a little while before it comes, you should protect your bulbs with a covering of cocoanut fibre.
For many years of her life one of the authors of this book was obliged to live mostly in London without a square yard of garden, but so great was her love of flowers and her desire to grow them that by degrees she made a ‘room garden’ for herself, and found endless interest and pleasure in it. She was prepared from the first to spend some time each day in feeding, washing, watering, and shifting her plants; otherwise success would have been impossible. Unfortunately, most of us know how miserable neglected or misunderstood plants soon get to look in a room—their leaves yellow and dusty, their flowers stunted, their soil either baked hard for want of water or sour and mossy through having more than they can digest.
We fear that if you are unlucky enough to have gas in your room you cannot have healthy plants at all—at any rate, you would have to content yourself with one or two that you could carry out of your gas-poisoned air every evening. But if you have no gas, and a sunny window in which you can place a good-sized plain wooden table, you may have a delightful room garden, as well as some pot plants in other places. To begin with, you would want some of the well-known hardy foliage plants that you can get from any good nurseryman. One of the best known is the Aspidistra, or Parlour Palm. You can get it with plain green or with variegated leaves. If it is in good health it sends up new leaves every spring, and makes queer dwarf flowers. When it seems too crowded for its pot you can either give it a bigger one, with some fresh soil, or divide it. This should be done in April or May. Young gardeners often make the mistake of giving a plant too big a pot when they change it. They hope in this way to persuade their plant to grow to a great size, but what they really do is to give its roots more soil than they can keep healthy, so it languishes or dies. One, or at most two, sizes larger than the last pot should be used, or, in the case of Aspidistras, you can divide and repot into the same size, or even smaller ones. Some people say these plants are impatient of disturbance, but we have found them easy to manage with a little care. Never use pots that are not both dry and clean. If they are dirty they must be well scrubbed with soap and hot water, and then well dried before you use them. You must also get a little good soil from a nursery gardener before you divide or repot any of your plants.
Besides Aspidistras, you can have some of the hardy Ferns, of which the Holly Fern is the most enduring; Aralias, which look like little Fig-trees; Indiarubber plants, whose young unfolding leaves it is such a pleasure to watch; various hardy Palms (Phœnix and Kentia, for instance); and some of the hardy Cactuses. The Indiarubber (Ficus Indica) and Palms are plants that you must be careful not to overpot. We know that from sad personal experience, as well as from some of the great authorities. In our early gardening days we often used to get a healthy Palm or Indiarubber from a good nursery, thinking when we bought it that the nurseryman was rather stupid and neglectful to leave the poor thing caged in that little pot of hard soil. We would bring it home, turn it out, find its roots in a thick mat, plunge them into a pot about four times the size of the old one, full of nice, loose, fresh soil, and expect it to grow like Jack’s Beanstalk in its happy new conditions. The ungrateful thing usually died. So remember that if you repot Indiarubber plants and Palms at all, take a pot only slightly larger than the last. Remember, too, that if you overwater an Indiarubber plant its leaves will turn yellow and drop off, while Palms must not be allowed to suffer from drought. It is death to nearly all plants to be allowed to stand in stagnant water. We mean that you must not leave the water in the saucer that has run out of the pot. When a plant is dry it is a good plan to plunge it in water nearly, but not quite, up to the brim of the pot, and to leave it there till the top of the soil is moist. That will show you that it has had enough to drink, and it should then be lifted out and allowed to drain before being replaced in its saucer. If you let plants stand in stagnant water day after day, they soak up more than they can digest—their leaves turn yellow, their roots rot, and they die. You can generally judge by the state of the pot whether you should give water. At least we know one good amateur gardener who would never water a plant in a moist pot, but only one in a pot that felt dry to the touch.
All foliage plants must be sponged once a week with a soft sponge and lukewarm water, as dust chokes and kills them. If you can put them out on some leads after sponging and spray them well with a syringe, so much the better, but this must be only done in mild weather. Remember, too, not to use ice-cold, hard water from a tap. In summer let them stand out in soft warm rain as often and as much as possible.
Many plants in pots die of starvation. When you drench them with water, the water that runs off carries plant food with it, and this is often not replaced. We used to use a little Clay’s Fertilizer, about half a small teaspoonful to a half-gallon of water, well mixed; but lately we have used Shefa, a new kind that is especially suitable for ferns. These liquid manures must never be given more than once a month, and never to flowering bulbs.
If you have more plants than will stand on your table in the window, you must shift some of them every week, and bring those that have had several days of semi-darkness to the light. You must also be careful not to let your plants stand in a draught. It is most injurious to them, especially when it is a cold one. If you have a light bathroom, with a good-sized window, and are allowed to use it, you would find it a help, as the air of a bathroom is sometimes steamy, and never as dry as that of a sitting-room. You could put plants that you wanted to nurse there, and more especially a succession of bulbs when they have made their roots in darkness and first need the light.
The real joy and glory of room gardens are the flowering bulbs, and the more you can have the better; but grow a few of many kinds rather than many of a few kinds, because then you will have a longer and more continuous succession. You do not want your room over-crowded at one time, and then empty of scent and colour. In September you should muster your glasses, bowls, and pots, and decide what you want and can afford to buy, and you must also choose what you will grow your bulbs in. Hyacinths, as you no doubt know, do well in water, and nowadays you can buy pretty squat glasses instead of the ugly tall ones we used to have. The bulb should almost, but not quite, touch the water; if it gets sodden, blue mould forms on it, and it decays. Crocuses are also grown in water in small glasses sold now for this purpose. The early Roman Hyacinths and the Polyanthus Narcissus will also flower well in this way. When you grow bulbs in water you will find that you must often add a little. The amount a Hyacinth in flower will drink is surprising. Many people change all the water in their bulb glasses once or twice in the season. A scrap of charcoal in each glass keeps the water clean and wholesome.
Many mixtures for growing bulbs are recommended. The one we like best for bowls without drainage is gravel mixed with a little carbon. You buy it in little sacks mixed ready for use at any of the big London shops that have a gardening department, and probably at any good florist’s elsewhere. Moss-fibre is satisfactory, too, but the gravel is cleaner to handle, and the carbon keeps the water sweet. From the moment that bulbs are planted in bowls they must not be allowed to become quite dry. If you think there is too much water, however, you must put your hand over the top of the bowl to keep your bulbs in place, tilt it a little, and drain off the water. For ordinary flower-pots a mixture of leaf-mould and sand is good, and while these are in the dark you must not water much, or the soil will get sour and unhealthy. In planting bulbs for a room garden, do not set them deeply in the gravel or moss-fibre. The point of the bulb should just show above ground. This applies also to bulbs grown in ordinary pots. Whatever medium you use should be damp when you finish your planting. Your bulbs must then be put into a dark, cool place for four weeks to make their roots. An airy cellar is good, but many people use a cool cupboard. They usually choose one that is sometimes opened, and therefore aired for a moment. At the end of the four weeks the bulbs must be brought into a light and cool, but not cold, place, and it was at this stage that we found a bathroom window so useful. When the green is well up and the flowers beginning to show, they may be moved to a light place in your warm sitting-room.
The first bulbs to push up are the white single Roman Hyacinths. These, if planted in September, will bloom in November, and will give you a little of the promise and fragrance of spring in the dull, dark days. Two dozen bulbs would be enough to buy, and of these one dozen should be started in September and the other dozen in October for succession. Next come the red and yellow Duc Van Thol Tulips, Crocuses, Trumpet Daffodils, and Hyacinths. The two earliest Daffodils are Trumpet-Major and Sir Henry Irving, and they should be planted in September. The Hyacinths look well either singly in glasses or three together in a bowl. In October plant some of the later Daffodils—for instance, Golden Spur, Princess Victoria, Emperor, and Empress. These may all be treated in the same way: set in gravel with a little carbon added, kept from frost and in the dark for four or five weeks, then brought to a cool, light place, and, when in bud, to the warm room. The Japanese Sacred Lily, which is so largely advertised, is only a large kind of Polyanthus Narcissus. It is easy to grow in a sunny window; but we should always buy Narcissus Gloriosa instead, as it is very like it, just as sweet, and about a quarter the price. All these Polyanthus Narcissi bloom well in pots without drainage, and if you have a blue-and-white bowl you should fill it with the one called Soleil d’Or. Scilly White, too, is easy to grow in a room.
So far our description of the room garden has dealt with foliage plants and spring flowers, but there are also many summer flowers that do well in a light window. In most parts of England the cottage windows show you that. For instance, you often see the blue or white hanging Campanula Isophylla, such a mass of flower that it covers the pot. It is an easy plant to manage and propagate. If you get a healthy specimen of it in May, it should flower all the summer. In the autumn cut it back a little and give a mild dose of liquid manure. It will flower for years without being repotted, and can be increased by cuttings put round the edge of a pot and stood in a window. Gardeners always put anything they want to strike near the edge, and not in the middle of a pot. Begonias make handsome room plants; so do Fuchsias, Heliotropes, and Geraniums. We have seen a big plant of Heliotrope that had lived for years in a Paris window, but it does not like the sooty air of our big cities. Some of the vigorous Ivies grow well in pots, and in Germany you often see them trained round picture-frames. We once brought a spray from the country that was so determined to grow that it rooted itself in an earthenware jug, lived for more than two years on an occasional drink of fresh water, and only died when we were away from home and could not attend to it. Geraniums would rather be dry than wet. The pretty white Spiræa and the little trailing yellow Musk are both very thirsty plants, and flag at once if you neglect them. The Vallota Purpurea, the Scarborough Lily, is a splendid window plant. When once you have potted it you should not disturb it, as it flowers best when it is almost bursting the pot with its big onion-shaped bulbs. The Vallota never cares to be wet, and after it has flowered it needs very little water; yet it must not become bone-dry. You will say these are difficult directions, and we can only agree with you. Gardening is an art that in the end must be largely learned by experience, and the earlier you begin to practise it the sooner you will find out some of the things all the books in the world cannot tell you. You cannot give a recipe for watering as you can give one for a cake or a pudding, because the same plant will need different quantities in different conditions and at different times. When you see leaves flag in their flowering season, they probably want water; when they turn yellow and drop off, they have probably had too much. In winter you must not water in a room likely to feel frost at night, as that would help to freeze the roots. You are sure to have some failures and some successes with your plants to the end of your gardening days, but every failure ought to teach you, and every success will spur you on. The true gardener loves his art so well that he will grow what he can even under difficult conditions.