320 ILLINOIS STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



There is another, and, as the writer believes, a better way. Hot-beds 

 constructed so as to use fire as a heater will prove far more reliable, and 

 at least no more expensive. My own beds, constructed with common drain 

 tile or flues, have worked admirably, and some of the advantages I find 

 to be briefly these: When the warm days come, which we often have 

 during our winters, the fire can be discontinued and the beds aired, 

 watered and worked, with impunity; the heat, as from a manure bed, is 

 not escaping and going to waste, but you are saving your fuel against 

 another spell of cold weather. 



Then the tendency of such beds is to be dr3-er, and, consequently, 

 more healthy for plants and vegetables. With such beds, all the board 

 covering, which I only use for tender plants, may be removed daily, 

 unless stormy, and thus admit light, so essential during protracted dark 

 or stormy weather. Never a day, all winter, except when storming, but 

 my hot-beds have been so treated, and daily ventilated, preventing drawn 

 and sickly plants and promoting growth. 



Another great advantage in the use of fire hot-beds : Lettuce, radishes, 

 pie-plant and such, as also cabbage plants, may be grown without any 

 other covering than the glass. I would except severe cold, strong winds, 

 snow and hail storms. Yet my beds have had no other covering than 

 glass, except tomato, cucumber plants, and the like. The market gar- 

 dener can appreciate the saving of labor in this item, as the regular daily 

 handling to cover and uncover with boards is a heavy tax. 



Dr. B. F. Long read a paper on his 



HORTICULTURAL EXPERIENCE. 



Mr. President : I have been requested to present you a statement of 

 my horticultural experience. I can only give a brief review of my labors, 

 part of which is taken from memoranda, but most from recollection. In 

 boyhood, I had a desire to change the character of the fruit of old trees 

 growing in my father's orchard, and having been told that the secret of 

 success in making "grafts grow" was the nice adjustment of the inner 

 bark of the cion to the inner bark of the stalk, and protecting them by 

 a clay composition, I went to work upon these principles, and succeeded 

 very well, using up quantities of old woolen rags and tow strings for 

 confining the composition to the stalks and lower portion of the graft. 

 At length, wax composition was discovered, but it was kept a secret for 

 many years, and used only by those who paid for it. With this discovery 

 commenced a rapid improvement in fruit-growing, and change. in the 

 quality of the fruit raised. The unsightly clay daubs upon the cut 

 limbs gave place to the neat dressing of plaster, and the success of grow- 

 ing the cions was in favor of the latter course. From the commence- 

 ment of this improvement there seemed to spring up new life in fruit- 

 growing, and " well to do " persons were not wanting, in most localities, 

 who, having obtained the secret of compounding the " grafting wax," 

 offered themselves to graft old orchards at a certain price for the grafts 

 that grew. 



