FRUIT-CULTURE. 277 



son, who has charge of them, is so careful about watering 

 the plants, that he would be unwilling to have me water them. 

 He would not allow any gardener in Massachusetts to water 

 them, because it is a very difficult thing. I do not mean to 

 say that there are not plenty of gardeners who would water 

 properly, but there are plenty of them who would ruin the 

 plants by water. He is so expert at that (though no more 

 expert than very likely I should be after a few trials), that, 

 by the least thump on the pot, he can tell whether there is 

 sufficient water for the plant or not. 



One great trouble that the ladies experience in growing 

 plants in the house is from insects. The time to kill those 

 is before you have any of them, as the Irish would express 

 it ; that is, they increase very fast, and the time to destroy 

 them is when they first make their appearance. The worst 

 rascal of an insect is the little red spider that works on 

 the under side of the leaf. A great many people do not 

 know that they have it on their plants, until the leaves all 

 turn 3^ellow. They begin to work on the midrib of the leaf, 

 and you will find a little streak of yellow there ; and some of 

 the ladies who are most successful in growing plants in the 

 house will detect that at once, and, without waiting to get 

 a dish and sponge to wash it off, they will take hold of the 

 leaf without any ceremony, and draw their finger along on 

 the under side of it ; and it is very bad for the spider. They 

 are a very tender little insect, not much larger, many of them, 

 than the point of a pin ; but they are very destructive, and 

 they oftentimes destroy the foliage of your shrubs and your 

 plants in the garden when you do not know what is the mat- 

 ter, unless you are acquainted with the cause. 



Question. As " an ounce of prevention is worth a pound 

 of cure," is there any way of preventing their coming at all? 



Capt. Moore. You will not know where to apply the 

 remedy until you detect the insects, because you do not have 

 tliem all the time, nor everywhere, and you would be applying 

 the remedy all around, perhaps where there is no need of it. 

 Tlie great naturalist, Huber, in describing the increase of the 

 aplih (I am not telling you this as my own belief, for it seems 

 to me almost incredible), says, that, if the wliole increase of a 

 single green fly that you see on a plant in the spring escaped 

 injury, the weight of tlie insects would amount, in one season, 



