7 MAY 1927, Page 14

A MIRACLE OF FROST.

Sonic very curious contrasts which may interest most amateur gardeners may be recorded of the really virulent succession of hard frosts that intrpduced the last week of April. Valuable secrets of cultivation are involved. In my garden one bush of that valuable and lusty plant, Buddleia reilehiana variabilis, was cut to ribbons. Almost every shoot fell flaccid and soon crumbled like plucked leaves of verbena. Young laburnum trees suffered as severely and obviously. Now this particular Buddleia bush was close against a high wall protecting it from the north and by a building yet more completely protecting it from the east. It enjoyed a singularly • snug and warm corner. Another Buddleia as well as a labur- num grow on the other side of the wall fully exposed to the north and cut off from the sun except at the zenith and in late evening. On these latter plants not a leaf was crumpled, much less crumbled. A frost that had flattened even nettles and ilex had left no tracs whatever, though they were in full leaf. Why ? What is the inference ?