Marck I, 1BS4.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



671 



Natube as a Guide in Gap.den Practice.— How we 

 may follow nature in the artificial^ cultuie of plants in 

 this country is a question which often presents itself to 

 cultivators, " and some have one opinion on the subject 

 and some another. When anyone succeeds in growing 

 any particular subject successfully, from the cultivator's 

 point of %'iew, and, as he may imagine, by following a 

 coarse not exactly what the plant affects naturally, we 

 are cautioned against the danger of imitating natui'e too 

 closely ; and when another succeeds by adhering to nature 

 as closely as possible, we are told that we cannot dis- 

 regard her teachings with impunity ; while some advocate 

 both courses, just as the spirit moves them, telling us 

 one week to follow nature, and the next cautioning us 

 against her teachings. For my own part, I venture to 

 think that no cultivator ever succeeded or is likely to 

 succeed in the culture of either plants or fruits who 

 does not draw his lessons from nature, but such lessons 

 must be drawn from the best examples which nature 

 furnishes and not from the worst, if we desire to read 

 her aright, and, above all, we must reckon the agents 

 through which she accomplishes her ends. These are 

 heat, light, air, moisture, and soil, &c. It would be easy 

 to find inferior examples among nature's own productions, 

 where some of those conditions were absent, but where 

 they are combined in the right degree natme produces 

 her noblest types. A tree or plant growmg in a genial 

 soil and situation, where it receives the light and air 

 freely on all its parts, is a very different object from 

 the same grown in a thicket, perhaps, when_ it has to 

 maintain a continual struggle for existence. Need it be 

 said that it is the first of those examples which the cult- 

 ivator should copy, and not the last ? If it be ailmitted 

 that nature works by tlie agencies we havp named, it is 

 for those who say that nature's laws may be set aside 

 occasionally, or disregarded, to prove that any of our 

 horticultural operations or practices are not connected 

 expressly with the %-iew of utiUsing and adjusting the 

 same forces by which nature acts, just according to the 

 altered conditions and circumstances, it may be, in which 

 the subjects treated are placed. Those who tell us not 

 to imitate nature err, I am afraid, in misinterpreting 

 her meaning, and unconsciously foUow her teachings all 

 the time. — J. S. H. — Aiiitralasian. 



On- an island situated at the mouth of the river La Plata, 

 in Sonth .tUnerica, there has been discovered a new esculent, 

 which is a taberous-rooted Solanum hke the old-fashioned 

 potato, an is therefore called a new species of potato. 

 The tubers were taken to Brest and given into the care 

 of M. Blanchard, gardener at the Seamen's Hospital in 

 that town. The novelty is named, after its discoverer, 

 Salanmii Ohroudi, and M. Blanchard speaks of it as follows: — 

 "From the time it came into my hands I have cultivated, 

 or rather left this plant in the same place, and for the 

 simple reason taht it was impossible to destroy it. Every 

 year, at the end of June or begmning of July, I took up 

 the produce. Notwithstanding all the pains taken in lifting 

 there remained enough in the soil to ensure a crop the 

 following year." Here it should be explained that this 

 new solanum has three sets of creeping stems, one of 

 which runs near the surface and throws up at intervals 

 yomig growth.s, which flower almost as soon as they appear. 

 Another strikes deeply into the soil and pronounces tubers, 

 whihst others take a path midway between these two aiid 

 content themselves with producing an enormous quantity 

 of almost microscoijical bulbets, which when detached 

 effectuallj' guarantee the plant against extermination. 

 M. Blanchard adds: "I believe in would be easy, simply 

 by means of good culture, to improve this plant. Ah-eady 

 there is a great improvement in the size of the tubers 

 compared with those received from II. Ohroud. The latter 

 were no longer than a nut, whilst some of those grown 

 by me are as a small hen's egg and good in flavour, having 

 a chestnutty taste, accompanied by a slight amount of 

 bitterness. We have used them both boiled and baked 

 but they arc best baked. The tubers are perfectly hardy, 

 having passed the winter of 1881 in the open ground, 

 and I may add that up to the present the haului has 

 shown no trace of disease." The plant is described as 

 very dwarf, growing only a foot in height, exceedingly 

 bushy, and in appearance like the common potato. Its 

 probable value will be for crossmg with the old stock for 

 the purpose of securing its proved hardiness in new seed- 



ling varieties. It has thriven in a warm district in Fiance, 

 and is supposed to be tender to frost and severe cold. — 

 Quee'iidander. 



Melox Manure.— The Moniteur da J'roduits Chimique^ 

 advises melon-growers to put coffee-grounds on their melon- 

 beds. They form a very stimulating manure, and greatly 

 improve the ilavour of the fruit. 



To makf. ca.v\-as stack colters waterproof take common 

 resin soap, dissolve in cold water to the consistency of 

 paint; give it a good coat thoroughly rubbed in; let dry 

 forty-eight hours; then soak in alum water for another 

 forty-eight hours, occasionally turning the cloth so as to 

 expose every part to the action of the alum ; dry, and 

 the article is ready. This should be repeated at least 

 once in two years when used and exposed to the weather, 

 as an awning usually is. 



Pottery Trees. — One of themostremarkableof those trees 

 which bear a stony or siUcious bark is the " Pottery Tree " 

 of Para, on the Amazon, termed " C'arapia " by the Bra- 

 ziUans, and known to botanists as the MoyuMea utilh. It 

 is a magnificent tree, and sometimes grows to 100 feet 

 before branching. The wood is exceedingly durable, 

 being largely impregnated with flint; but the principal 

 value of the tree Ues in its bark, which is used by the 

 Indians for furnishing the raw material of pottery. It 

 is not that vessels are made from the bark itself, as 

 they are sometimes made from gourds and calabashes : 

 but the bark is burned, and the siUcious ashes mixed 

 with a proportion of river-clay make a strong and service- 

 ! able ware. — Indian Jf/ricluhti-ist. 



Tomato Vin-es fob Cattle. — In looking over a file of the 

 New York Trihvjie for 1848 wecame cross the followingitem 

 from the Cheraw (S. 0.) Gazette of September 3, 1848, which 

 maybe new to many of our readers and of practical value. 

 It states that "in addition to the advantages of the 

 tomato for table use the vine is of great value for food 

 for cattle, esnecially for crows. It is said that a cow 

 fed on tomato" vines' will give more milk and yield butter 

 of a finer flavour and in greater abundance than any 

 other long feed ever trie<l. It is thought too, that more 

 good food for cattle, and at less exper.,-c, can be raised 

 on a given quantity of ground planted in tomatoes than 

 from any other vegetable known in the Southern country. 

 — American Grocer. 



Bud Variation-.— Negative evidence is not usually good 

 evidence, but when we know that countless millions of 

 friut and flowers have in the past 101) years been bud- 

 ded anil grafted without the individuality of the variety 

 being in any way affected by the stock, and that only 

 a few instances, such as the Oytissus purpiu:cus and the 

 Bizzaria Orange, can be cited as exceptions, is it not fair 

 to infer that these almost solitary cases are due to what 

 Mr. Darwin calls " bud variation ?" a condition by no 

 means uncommon in scores of families of -plants which 

 are never budded or grafted. Nearly all of us see every 

 season scarlet and scarlet and white striped carnations 

 on the same plant. Dahlias are found crimson, crimson 

 and white, and sometimes almost pure white on the same 

 plant Last spring we had plants of the double scarlet 

 hibiscus with scarlet, orange, and scarlet and orange— - 

 three distinct kinds of flowers on the same plant; and 

 that wonderfiU freak of nature, the striped tea rose, 

 American Banner, was a " sport " from a plant of Bon 

 Silene, and has no resemblance to it, either in flower or 

 foliage. Scores of other instances could bo cited if time 

 would permit, but enough has been shown, I think, at 

 least to throw doubt on the theory that the stock affects 

 the individuality of the graft. In the past quarter of a 

 centm-y millions upon millions of Bartlett pears and Balil- 

 win apples have have been grafted upon millions of 

 stocks ; and yet today they are as true to their individual- 

 ity as the Concord grape or AVilson's strawhei^'y that 

 are perpetuated by cuttings or runners, and none ot 

 them are in any way changed from when they first ap- 

 peared, unless liy the temporary accidents of soil or climate. 

 I believe that the smallest or the greatest of the works 

 of creation has a separate and distinct indiridnality, and 

 that they cannot be blended except by generation, and 

 that the product of generation, whether m the lowest 

 microscopic germ or in the highest type man, has an 

 individuaUty distinct and separate that it cannot attacn 

 to- a.aot)xer.— Australasian, 



