104 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



put up in sections of our own country. Where there is plenty 

 of good land it does not seem right to pay money out to other 

 sections for fruit we can grow so easily ourselves. 



The handling of the blackberry is so nearly like that of the 

 raspberry that I will not stop very long on that, but I do want 

 to bring up the subject of the currant and gooseberry a little 

 more to you. I think that both the currant and the gooseberry 

 are hot developed in this country the way they should be. 

 These last few years the markets of our large cities have been 

 supplied with currants from New York, Nova Scotia, New 

 Jersey, — everywhere but New England. I failed this year to 

 find in the Boston market, enough currants to supply the market 

 any one day, that w^ere grow^n in New England. This is a fruit 

 that ought to be grown more, particularly among the small 

 trees, and it can be grown to good advantage here as well as 

 in other states. I know in New York at the time the vineyards 

 w^ere planted there, a great many currants were put out, and 

 at one time the market overflowed with them, but now^ things 

 have evened up more, and besides more people are getting to 

 use them. The foreign population require them, so we must 

 grow them on a larger scale ourselves. Any good soil that is 

 fairly cool and moist will grow currants very nicely. I would 

 not advise planting them in light sandy soil, but a soil that has 

 good depth and plenty of moisture and is cool during the sum- 

 mer will grow splendid currants. They can be planted about 

 at the rate of 800 to 1000 bushes to the acre. And the same 

 holds good of the gooseberry. In England where the goose- 

 berry is at home and probably in its native element more than 

 anywhere else, everybody has gooseberries as commonly as 

 straw^berries. The same is true in Germany and Denmark. 

 They think the gooseberry is one of the finest fruits grown. 

 We are apt to think of it as a little, sour, hard fruit, only fit 

 for preserving. But I assure you we can grow just as good 

 gooseberries of the large eating varieties as can be grown in 

 England. I know of a young Danish fellow in ^vlalden who 

 has hybridized a great deal in gooseberries. He has produced 

 a berry which runs almost an inch and a half long, has a very 

 thin skin, and one of the highest quality berries that you ever 

 tasted. He sent some of the bushes he has produced from this 

 variety to his brother in Denmark where they know goose- 



