196 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



1st lot of bO 13 grew. 



2d " - -.10 " 



3d " - 8 " 



4th " - 12 " 



5th " 17 " 



Gth " "- 11 " 



7th " -.12 '• 



8th " 18 " 



9th '' 17 " 



10th " 13 " 



Total grew -.130 



This is 26 per cent. Some insist on it that a test in the open air is the only 

 sure and fair one. It may be so, sometimes, but not always, unless very great 

 pains are taken. For example, the moles are often troublesome in our gardens, 

 passing along the rows and taking many of the peas and sometimes nearly all. 

 Perhaps -wrinkled or very large peas of some varieties would be less injured by 

 the weevil than those above tested-. 



Vegetable Seeds from Jajjan. 



A reference was made in my last report, to about 40 varieties of vegetable 

 seeds received from Japan. I saved seeds of all which matured them. So 

 those which were biennial were sowed to grow seeds this 3'ear. 



The cucumber did well, and much resembles the one in common cultivation 

 known as long green. The lettuce grew large and fast, but was tough and 

 strong when compared with several other varieties in the garden. Tlie onions 

 grown last year were small. This year a few seeds were saved. They are 

 probably worthless. The white beans did much better this year than last. 

 The balsam apple is a cucurbitaceous plant bearing a knotty fruit as large as a 

 large apple. When ripe it bursts open and exposes a bright red pulp. In 

 this case as in several others, we should need the Japanese to tell us how to 

 make use of their peculiar vegetables. 



The squashes were larger and better this year than last, though they are still 

 far behind tlie Hubbard and the Marblehead. We raised some of the radishes 

 which belong to the same germs as those in common cultivation. They were 

 not tested this year. They grew fast, and were long, white and very tender. 

 Last year they were quite strong. Last year among several lots of seeds named 

 radishes there was one lot which produced tops quite unlike all the others. It 

 had a suspicious look which appeared familiar. It was hardy and wintered 

 well in the ground. This season it threw up more leaves and a tall branching 

 flower stalk. It bloomed and went to seed. I showed it to visitors who recog- 

 nized it. Here was the common burdock improved. The part above ground 

 differed some from our weedy plant by the name above given. The leaves 

 were somewhat smaller, the heads of flowers broader and larger, but it answers 

 the description of a variety of the burdock. Last year I remarked that the 

 roots were long, white and tender, but rather strong. When observing this 

 plant I always repeated to visitors K. W. Emerson's definition of a weed, viz. : 

 "A weed is a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered. Every plant, 

 probably, is yet to be of utility in the arts. There is not a plant in the whole 

 magazine of material nature that cannot be made a power in the hands of 

 thinking men." 



