A FIELD OF ARUMS
At first only those kinds that were already well known in the islands were cultivated—Scilly Whites, Soleil d’Ors, Grand Monarques, Pheasant Eyes, and the Yellow Daffodil; but now many of the newest and most valuable varieties may be seen.
It is no sinecure to be a flower-farmer nowadays. The heaviest work is, of course, during the harvest; but transplanting the bulbs, clearing the ground, and trimming the shelters keep the farmers very busy during the summer; and those who force bulbs in glass-houses have hard work to get everything done before the winter sets in.
The bulbs increase very rapidly in the ground, and are now exported as well as blossoms. Some sorts need to be transplanted and divided every few years; but Scilly Whites may be left in the same place for twenty years without, apparently, taking any harm.
The dead leaves of the bulbs are raked off in summer when they are dry and sere, and are used as fodder for the cattle instead of hay. They were originally used for litter, to supply the scarcity of straw; but it was noticed that the cattle ate their bedding with great gusto, and seemed to flourish on it, although the green growing leaves are poison to them. So now ricks of lily-leaves may be seen side by side with the hay-ricks.
Every one who has a yard of ground to spare grows flowers. The harvest sometimes begins as early as the middle of December, and is not over until June, but the real press of the work is during February and March. Then every “steamer-morning,” that is to say every other week-day, from six o’clock to half-past nine you may hear a continuous rattle and rumble of carts, barrows, and trucks, laden with wooden boxes of flowers, making their way to St. Mary’s Quay. They come from all parts; from the large fields by Old Town, from the sheltered valleys “back of the country,” from the sunny slopes of Porth Hellick, from the little gardens on Garrison Hill. The off-islands also send their share; Tresco, St. Agnes, and St. Martin’s in flat-bottomed barges towed by the steam-launch that brings their mails, while heavily laden sailing-boats put in from Bryher, until one wonders how it is possible that all these contributions can ever be stowed away in the hold of the “Lyonnesse.”
The children of St. Mary’s have three weeks’ or a month’s holiday from school during the busy season, the boys for picking flowers and the girls for tying. Sometimes the girls will beg for leave to go into the fields for a change; but it is backaching work, and wet work too, very often. The men and boys usually wear leggings to protect themselves from the long, dripping wet leaves.
As soon as they are picked the flowers are put in water in the glass-houses. The bunching and tying is chiefly done by the women and children, and is paid for at the rate of threepence for a hundred bunches. A quick worker can make fifteen to twenty shillings a week. Some of them tie them in their own homes, and you may see cartloads and barrowloads of flowers, in boxes or baskets, being delivered at the cottage-doors loose, and fetched again later on, neatly tied, twelve in a bunch, and ready for packing. The flower-houses on the day before the steamer leaves are a sight to behold—banks of daffodils and narcissi, wallflowers and anemone fulgens, tier upon tier. Afterwards they are packed in shallow wooden boxes, each containing three, five, or six dozen bunches; and at busy times the lights of the houses burn far into the night, showing that packing for next day’s steamer is still going on within. And the tap, tap of the hammer of the box-maker is constantly heard at all hours throughout the flower-season.
The weather is of course a very important factor in the success or failure of the flower crop. A wet summer may prevent the bulbs from ripening; a strong gale in early spring may ruin thousands of flowers. The salt spray in a storm is swept right across the islands, spotting and blackening the blossoms so that they are unfit for the market; and although at a little distance a field may look delightful, it may prove on examination to be worthless, full of damaged flowers. So it is easy to understand why the growers prefer to pick the buds half-blown than to run the risk of their destruction.
There is a great difference between year and year in the abundance of the harvest. To give two examples: In the season 1908-9 there was no great show of flowers, but picking began about the middle of December, and went on continuously for four or five months. Prices kept up particularly well, owing to late frosts in the Riviera, and Scillonians were well content. They were proud to boast of having supplied the Battle of Flowers at Nice when the French gardens were under snow, in spite of the heavy protective duty that has to be paid. The following season, 1909-10, was quite a contrast. It was a record year for quantities, but the harvest began much later. The flowers came on with a rush in February, and all kinds seemed to be in bloom at the same time, and to bloom as they had never bloomed before. They were, in fact, too plentiful. “There’s a boolk o’ flowers,” as one man put it, “but they ain’t fetching no such tremendous price.” It was thought that the floods in Paris also helped to bring down the prices, for people were in no mood for buying flowers there, and the surplus supplies were shipped to England.