THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. Tl 



"Ever\'bod3' nowadays talks about it. Like electricity, 

 the cholera germ, woman's rights, the great mining boom 

 and the Eastern Question it is 'in the air.' It pervades 

 societ}' everywhere with its subtle essence." So it was 

 with squashes and pumpkins fed on milk. Nothing, seem- 

 ingly, but the moon controlling the weather, could equal it. 



Onh' one person, a farmer in Pennsjdvania, claimed to 

 have actually had personal experience. But even he said 

 it was "a neighbor," who fed the pumpkin not by cutting 

 a hole and pouring the milk in, but he insisted that the 

 first leaves towards the root should be cutoff and the milk 

 poured into the tubular leafstalk. He laid great stress on 

 the exact leaf, (not the one on the other side of the pump- 

 kin) and that it must be cut close up to the leaf. Indeed, 

 he went into detail that so flavored of occult performance 

 that it would have been in harinony for him to have 

 brought in something about looking to the north, after 

 sundown, and turning around three times. 



Several botanists thought that it could be done, but 

 none had tried it notwithstanding the ver^^ important 

 bearing it would have on phj-siologic botanj^if the interior 

 of the squash ovary or the interior of the stem could di- 

 gest or assimilate milk. If it could do that why not other 

 substances, why not a sort of hA'podermic chemical feed- 

 ing. If^but think of the possibilities — and the great im- 

 portance — and 3'et every one of these botanists had 

 neglected the opportunity of making himself famous! 



Even the Department of Agriculture at Washington 

 had heard of this but had not investigated it. Here is the 

 letter from that Institution : 



"Your letter of August 24, addressed to this depart- 

 ment, is at hand. I regret that we have no references at 

 hand to literature on the subject of feeding squashes with 

 milk. I have heard of this practice, but have never seen a 

 squash thus fed. 



Regretting our inability to help you in this matter, 

 I am, Very truly yours, 



A. F. Woods, 

 Pathologist and Physiologist. 



