140 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ILLINOIS 



But we have something to say in regard to the Miner that Mr. Adair 

 says were " all stung last year." 



We very much doubt the fact ; for we cannot conceive it to be pos- 

 sible, or even probable, that a plum that has annually withstood the 

 attacks of the curculio and plum gouger for thirty-eight years in Illinois 

 without material injury, can be subject lo destruction in Kentucky (?r a«v- 

 where else. 



Our late State Entomologist, Benjamin D. Walsh, says : 



" The Miner Plum is almost curculio-proof, though it is attacked to a limited extent 

 by the plum gouger. We report, therefore, that the Miner or Hinkley Plum is certainly 

 the Plum for the million on account of its hardiness, productiveness, and almost com- 

 plete exemption from the attacks of the curculio. (Am. Entom., Vol. I, fol. 93.) 



" Our present State Entomologist, Dr. \Vm. Le Baron, says, in a paper published 

 in 1872: '1st. That the eggs deposited in the Plum (Miner) by the plum curculio 

 generally perish without damaging the fruit. 2d. That in many cases the larvEe of the 

 plum gouger penetrate to the stone, but perish without damaging the Plum.' Prof. 

 C. V. Riley, State Entomologist of Missouri, to whom fruit-growers are indebted for 

 one of the best papers ever written upon the curculio, says : ' The Miner or Hinkley, 

 and other varieties of that wild species known as the Chickasaw Plum, are less liable to 

 curculio attacks than other kinds.' (Trans. 111. Hort. Soc, Vol. Ill, fol. 85.) We 

 close the buggy part of this paper in the words of Benjamin D. Walsh : ' As to the 

 complete exemption of the Miner Plum from injui7 by the curculio there can be no doubt ; 

 on this point all atithorities agree.'' " 



In view of the above testimony we are inclined to believe that the 

 Kentucky Miner was a bogus, (a variety extensively dealt in by tree ped- 

 lars); or it might have been z. gosling. Rural says the curculio will bite the 

 goose, and we all know he is a man we can tie to ; or it might have been 

 a seedling. It is an established fact that the Miner or Hinkley plum will 

 not come true from seed. The seedlings are not good Darwinians, and 

 do not develop worth a cent, but go back toward their wild state every 

 time. Bushels of seed have been sown, and as yet not a single seedling 

 has been produced equal to the Miner. The tree is a prolific bearer ; 

 the fruit, when ripe, falls to the ground. In gathering up the ripe plums 

 more or less will be trodden into the soil, and from pits thus planted 

 seedlings will come up. Thousands of seedlings, taken from around 

 genuine trees, have been sold by the pedlars in the Northwest, and have 

 disappointed the producers by producing worthless plums, inferior to the 

 common wild plum grown in the neighboring thickets. 



Up to 1868 the plum in question was almost unknown outside the 

 mining region. It was a kind of family affair, and had as many names 

 as a new baby ; it was known as the Hinkley, Townsend, Isabella, Robin- 

 son, Chickasaw and Miner. The Illinois Horticultural ;Society thought, 

 as the child was thirty-five years old, it was about time it should be chris- 

 tened ; and at the Dixon meeting, in 1870, a committee was appointed 

 to collect facts in regard to the name and origin of the plum, and report 

 at the meeting to be held at Rockford, in 1871. The committee, by H. 

 H. McAfee, reported : 



" That they find under cultivation, throughout this District and adjoining States, a 

 class of Plums known by many different names, more or less of a local character, which 



