248 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



of tliis delicious fruit, and which promises the cultivator so 

 great a reward. 



It is more than twenty years since I entered upon the culti- 

 vation of the vine with hit^h hopes, believing that the cranberry 

 was a hard thing to exterminate, that it would destroy grass 

 in all situations and in all soils, and cause even hassocks to 

 disappear. And after a trial and many years of observation, I 

 find the cranberry a hard plant to destroy, except with the 

 plough, and that it will not root out and destroy all grasses in 

 all situations and soils. I find that in some soils the vine will 

 not drive out certain kinds of grasses when in other soils, it 

 may succeed. Take, for instance, that kind of sedge grass 

 which we call hassock-grass — this upon banks of streams, and 

 in our swales where it is more or less wet, roots with such 

 strong hold, and throws up the blades of grass so thickly, that 

 there is no room for the vine in a soil less rich, and the vine 

 will in all probability succeed. 



Take, for instance, the osmunda spectahilis, called in this 

 vicinity buckthorn, and known to botanists by the name of 

 flowering fern. This grows in the form of a tree, its slender 

 stem supporting a large top with a large leaf, overshadowing 

 all around, and shutting out the sun, light and air so much that 

 the vine cannot grow. On one occasion I set out vines among 

 the flowering fern, and in about three or four years the sods of 

 vines could not be found. Close by the side of this was a 

 large bed of vines covering nearly a quarter of an acre of 

 ground, except four or five little places, of a few yards in each, 

 which was flowering fern, or buckthorn. In order that the 

 ground might be comparatively covered with vines, I cut up and 

 carted this buckthorn to the upland, and set sods of vines in 

 its place, expecting that they would some day take the place 

 of the buckthorn. In this I have not been disappointed, for 

 these plats are loaded with the largest fruit; so thickly do the 

 berries lay this day, that, in some places, they would, if col- 

 lected and laid upon a level place, completely cover the ground. 

 But this quarter of an acre of vines in a few years was gone, 

 except a few stray runners ; the flowering fern had taken their 

 plaee, and the plats I set out arc only left to tell where the 

 original bed of vines stood. Now I do not suppose that in 



