132 ANNUAL REPORT OF NEAV-YORK 



other varieties brought from southern and eastern climes, have 

 shortened the period of their maturity by long continued and 

 wise culture here. I risk nothing in saying that this assertion is 

 most certainly untrue, and is founded in some mistaken interpre- 

 tation of facts. I doubt whether, within the widest range of 

 vegetable culture, one well-attested proof can be brought of a 

 perennial shortening the season of its maturity, habitually. An 

 actually new- development of the species, from the soil and air of 

 a given place, is needful hopefully to produce such a change. 

 Indeed, this reproduction must often extend to a second and third 

 time, to receive the needed shortness of season. 



e. In order to the perfection of a plant, whether herbaceous or 

 woody, and whether annual or perennial, its annual expansion of 

 limb and fruit should be reached, especially in the case of tropi- 

 cals, before the occurrence of severe autumnal chills. In that 

 case the branches and leaves will be found filled with matter in 

 such a state of elaboration as is sufficient to mature the fruit. 

 Hence the practice, now nearly universal in the northern states, 

 of cutting up Indian corn soon after the ear is Avell glazed, and 

 setting it up in shocks. Experience proves that the accumulated 

 secretions of the stalk and leaf are sufficient for the ripening of 

 the ears; while the fodder also is richer than if left in the snn 

 and wind to a later period of time. So similarly, our gardeners 

 often pull up tomatoes by the roots, on the eve of an expected 

 frost, and hang them up in out-houses, or make them into small 

 heaps, where it is found much of the green fruit will mature. 

 On the contrary, if such crops are left out under a light frost the 

 leaves are not only killed, and thus all further active elaboration 

 prevented, but the health of the fruit is more or less jeopardized 

 from the corruption of the half frozen herbage. So further, when 

 a tropical, or even hardy plant, is struck with frost, in a highly 

 immature state, that plant exhibits many young immature cells, 

 of course filled with immature fluids. These vessels can never 

 subsequently ripen, nor will their crude juices ever become 

 available either to the maturity of the plant or its fruit. Nothing 

 but connection with the earth and air, through the medium of 

 the leaf, can ever condense and enrich such juices. Not only 

 will they be unavailing, but they will subsequently become a 

 means of disease to the plant. Such young vessels and juices are 



