242 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



that a trimming of both tops and roots will make a difference as 

 regards earliness. Now if we find this difference where the 

 same kind is planted, of course we shall find the same apparent 

 difference in the matter of earliness where the two kinds are 

 similarly treated, when in reality there would be no difference. 

 I have also found in my experience that a kind which I knew 

 by two years of experimenting as an early sort, when planted 

 where it had apparently every condition to favor earliness, 

 ripened its fruit later than any kind I raised that season ; a les- 

 son to me not to pronounce too emphatically from the result of 

 the experimenting of a single season. I have found Early 

 York, Hubbard (which I think is the same thing), Dwarf 

 Scotch, Essex Early, Keyes and General Grant, among my 

 earliest. Trophy is an early sort, though not of the very ear- 

 liest ; Maupay, Lester's Perfected (or Fejee), New Mexican 

 and Valencia Cluster, I rank among my latest sorts. 



Discussing the tomato with reference to size, I class Dwarf 

 Scotch, Early York, Hubbard, Essex Early, Keyes, General 

 Grant, Charter Oak, New White Apple and Orangefield, as 

 below the average ; and believe their peculiar place (of all but 

 Orangefield) to be as early tomatoes, though in •yield both 

 Early York and General Grant are hard to surpass. The Trophy 

 is decidedly the largest of tomatoes yet introduced that are 

 available for market. The spherically round tomatoes are 

 more apt to fail in filling out solid than the flat-round sort, and 

 particularly is this true after the hottest part of the season is 

 past. They are also more liable to be green, unripe and 

 cracked near the stem than the other sorts. Tomatoes differ 

 as much in flavor as do different varieties of apples ; and soil 

 and seasons appear to have some influence. Some are very 

 sour, some sweet, others at times bitter, and again at times a 

 rotten flavor is present. The quantity of the crop depends a 

 great deal on its earliness. I have had a yield at the rate of 

 over one thousand bushels of ripe tomatoes to the acre. 



I pass from the general discussion to the merits and peculiari- 

 ties of some of the varieties. I find both Alger and Keyes to be 

 tomatoes of excellent flavor, and these are each distinguished 

 by a foliage very similar to and suggestive of the potato, to 

 which the tomato family is allied ; the flavor of each of these 

 vegetables suggests the other ; and the fruit of the tomato suggests 



