For some years past, the sale of flowers has been gradually increasing.
Into the larger cities, such as Paris for example, they are introduced by
the car load, and along about the first of January the consumption of
them is extraordinary. All choice flowers are now being cultivated by
improved methods that assure of an abundant production of them. What
twenty years ago would have appeared to be an antiquated mechanism, viz.,
an apparatus for making bouquets, has now become a device of prime
necessity by reason of the exigencies of an excessive demand.
Mr. Myard, a gardener of Chalon-sur-Saone, and vice-president of the
horticultural society of that city, has devised a curious apparatus,
which we represent herewith from a photograph.
This bouquet machine, which the inventor styles a _bouquetiere_, consists
of a stationary rod (shown to the right of the figure), upon which slides
a spool wound with twine, and the lower part of which is provided with
three springs for keeping the twine taut. A horizontal arm at the top
supports a guide or pattern whose curve is to be followed, on placing the
flowers in position. This arm is removed or turned aside after the
binding screw has been loosened, in order that the rod to the left that
carries the bouquet may be taken out. A guide, formed of a steel ribbon,
is fixed to the arm and to its movable rod by means of binding screws,
which permit of its being readily elongated. This central rod can be
raised or lowered at will, and, owing to these combinations, every
desired form of bouquet may be obtained.
[Illustration: APPARATUS FOR MAKING BOUQUETS.]
The rod to the left is provided with a steel pivot, and contains several
apertures, into which a pin enters, thus rendering it easy to begin
bouquets at different heights.
The bouquet is mounted upon the rod to the left, as shown in the figure.
The pin passes through the rod and enters a loop formed at the extremity
of the twine, and thus serves as a point of support, and prevents the
bouquet from falling, no matter what its weight is. When the pin is
removed in order that the bouquet may be taken out, the loop escapes.
At the lower part of the rod upon which the bouquet is mounted, there is
a collar with three branches, by means of which a rotary motion is given
to the flowers through the aid of the hand. The twine used for tying is
thus wound around the stems. When the apparatus is in motion, the twine
unwinds from the spool, and winds around the rod that carries the
flowers, and twists about and holds every stem.
An experienced operator can work very rapidly with this little apparatus,
which has been constructed with much care and ingenuity, and which enters
into a series of special mechanisms that is always of interest to know
about.
The manufacturer was advised to construct his apparatus so that it could
be run by foot power, but, after some trials, it was found that the
addition of a pedal and the mechanism that it necessitates was absolutely
superfluous, the apparatus working very well such as it is.--_La Nature_.
* * * * *
[Continued from SUPPLEMENT, No. 567, page 9057.]