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FRUITS IN THEIR SEASON. 173"
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
. Vii. King Pikje Apphe. "The King* Neve...
Influence , in the free open air . This experiment was tried in 1847 at Bietonin Devonshirewhere some plants in pots , to which no
fire-heat had , at any time , been applied , were placed out after they had blossomed , in the month of May , in beds of leaves in the open
garden ; a bank was thrown up around them to keep off currents of cold windand the whole surface of the ground , for some distance ,
covered with , charred hay , the black substance so increasing the heat-absorbing power of the ground as to repel niglit frosts and
maintain a healthy growth during the daytime . Though the _temj _} erature of the immediate spot was occasionally below forty degrees ,
—some nights had been frosty , and some days quite sunless , —thefruit matured to an average weight of four poundsand . in one
in-, stance to six pounds , and its flavor was perfect , a result which could not be attributed to high temperature or long continued sunshine , and
therefore could only be traced to the free access of air constantly passing over the plants to nourish and invigorate them . So bold
a system could , however , be hardly relied upon as generally applicable , and the special advantage it offers is combined with _others
in one of the newest modes of culture , which consists in heating the pine-pit with pipes of hot water under its beds of tan , while
other pipes , communicating with the outside at some distance from the pit , keep up a continual supply of pure air .
So delicate a feeder , subsisting principally' upon the lighter elementscan afford to be very indifferent to the grosser aliment
, derivable from soil , and the Ananas is therefore content to root in the poorest substance that can just form a vehicle for its delicate
nourishment . Sandy soil , taken from heaths or commons , is much usedon account of its porosityand one famous pine-grower "
, , recorded that he had made the experiment of planting- it in mere moss mixed with broken _jDotswhen the plant made quite as much
, progress as those in rich compost , an evident proof that water and air constitute the principal food of the pine-apple . Dr . Lindley yet
further asserts , that all the _Bromeliacese , as plants of this family are termed uitder the modern nomenclature , are capable of existing
in a hot dry air without even contact with the earth , on which account , he says , they are favorites in South American gardens ,
where they are suspended in the buildings or hung to the balustrades of the balconiessituations in which they flower abundantly ,
, filling the air with fragrance . In accordance with this great botanist's statement is the testimony of the practical gardener
Spechley , who .-wrote a very complete treatise on the pine apple , in which it is mentioned that a large sucker will vegetate af fcer having *
lain six of the hottest months of the year exposed to the sun in the hothouse" whereas almost any . other plant of the same size
and substance , would in that situation lose its vegetative powers in less than one-tenth of that time . Successful culture , however ,
depends greatly upon a proper degree of humidity , and the
hygrometer should be considered as indispensable an instrument in the *
Fruits In Their Season. 173"
FRUITS IN THEIR SEASON . 173 "
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), May 1, 1861, page 173, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01051861/page/29/
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