194 



DOMESTIC NOTICES. 



was carefully planted in a flower pot, in Kentucky, i 

 and watched till it bore fruit. I require you to be- ] 

 lieve both these chann;es. When assured of your 

 faith, I will believe your Portland witchcraft, as 

 soon as I believe in the two miracles I have related, 

 but not before. Had the transformation taken p ace 

 in Salem, no one could have doubted, as greater 

 wonders transpired there whilst they were still "in 

 the woods." Your Cincinnati Friend. Cincin- 

 nati, August 25, 1847. 



p. S. There are things about Boston as hard to 

 believe. — They there have two varieties of Seedling 

 Strawberries — the one " average 63 inches in cir- 

 cumference, and the other 4, under ordinary culti- 

 vation." There can be no doubt of the fact, for it 

 is stated in their Horticultural paper, and the 

 strawberry committee, by their silence, endorse it. 

 Their climate and soil must be more congenial to 

 this fruit than ours, for with us the fruit will not 

 average the half of that size. Does it with you? 

 It seems strange to mc that this fruit should sell so 

 high, and be so scarce in Boston, when so well 

 suited to the climate ! I discover, by a late publi- 

 cation, that three of their gardeners, who bring the 

 greatest supply to their market, did not sell more 

 bushels in a year, than one of our gardeners does in 

 a day. Whilst they ihere command 20 cents per 

 quart, they are sold here for 5 cents. 



The Nectarine only a sub-variety. — Dear 

 Sir : In a lot of Seedling Peaches which fruited the 

 past season, /rom .fioncs planted by myself , I had 

 one tree which produced nectarines. Mr. Long- 

 woRTH, of Cincinnati, must not be so faithless ! 

 Yours, John M. Ives. Salem, Mass., Sept. 13, 1847. 



[Remarks. — Our ''Cincinnati friend" will see by 

 the above note from Mr. Ives, that the " miracle" 

 has also occurred in Salem! If he will now turn 

 to the Bon Jardinier, the standard French work on 

 Horticulture, he will see that there is no such dis- 

 tinct fruit as nectarine recognized by the authors 

 (if that work, who are the first practical and theo- 

 retical gardenersin France. In describing PeucAes 

 in that work, there are simply two classifications 

 made, viz : Peches duretevses, (downy peaches — 

 what we call peaches,) and Peches losses (smooth 

 peaches — what we call nectarines.) — Ed.] 



Protecting tender Roses. — In your first vol- 

 ume the subject of protecting tender Roses in win- 

 ter was alluded to, but the very best method yet re- 

 sorted to has not been published, so far kh I know, 

 in any periodical or book. It is practiced with 

 wonderful success in this neighborhood, where there 

 are many rose fanciers, especially among the ladies. 

 Its extreme simplicity and economy strongly re- 

 commend it. For even the most tender lea roses it 

 is perfect. Collect a number of cedar boughs, and 

 stick them round the bushes, drawing them togeth- 

 er into a cone at top, and slightly tying them there. 

 The rose does not want protection from cold in our 

 climate, but the tender kinds must be shielded from 

 sleet and snow, and the cedars do this effectual 1}'. 

 This information may save thousands of plants, and 

 cultivators, instead of planting small ones every 

 spring, may acquire large bushes. I have seen the 



top of a considerable cedar tree cut down, and 

 placed over a tender running rose with perfect suc- 

 cess. /. J. Smith. Germantown, near Phila- 

 delphia, Sept. 6. 1847. 



Melons in a clay soil. — Although there is so 

 little difficulty in growing melons in New Jersey 

 and Long Island, that the market gardeners raise 

 them in fields by wagon loads, for the markets of 

 New-York and Philadelphia, yet it is quite a diflfer- 

 ent matter in many parts of New England. More 

 especially is this the case in portions of it, where 

 the soil is rather cold and clayey, as happens to be 

 the fact in my own garden. 



This year, for the first time, I have succeeded in 

 getting a most abundant and most excellent crop of 

 that high flavored and delicious musk melon, the 

 " Citron ;" and as I am sure there are others in 

 the northern part of the Union who would be glad 

 to arrive at tlie same result, I hasten to make 

 known my mode for their benefit. 



In the first place, as the melon loves a light and 

 sandy soil, and mine is clayey and heavy, I begin 

 by opening a trench in a suitable part of the gar- 

 den, say fifty feet long, and three feet wide. To 

 this trench I brought two cart loads of sand, and 

 two cart loads of manure. These I mixed with the 

 soil, and trenched the whole space of the size I 

 have named about twenty inches deep — leaving it 

 light and friable. This was done about the first of 

 May. 



I then sowed the melon seeds in a single drill 

 along the centre of the trenched slip. In order to 

 give them a little additional shelter, bring them 

 forward rather earlier, and protect them from the 

 ravaeesof the striped bug. I covered them, as soon 

 as planted, with a rough frame, made of four pieces 

 of board, six inches high. The frame is made like 

 a box without a top and bottom, and it is a foot 

 wide; the length of the board say twelve feet, and is 

 covered on the top with millinet, or any cheap cotton 

 stuff— if of the latter it is oiled. This, I find, gives 

 protection enough to bring forward the melons 

 thiee weeks earlier than if planted without pro- 

 tection ; and if the boxes are laid away about the 

 1st of June, when they are no longer needed, they 

 will last several years. 



I have now (August 2d) a plentiful supply for 

 my family from one row of the dimensions named, 

 in soil, too, where [ had not previously been able 

 to get melons usually before the last of this month, 

 and the crc^p a very precarious one then. Yours, 

 Northampton, Mass., August 2d, 1847. 



AmmoniacalLiq.uor for Manure. — Will some 

 one of your chemical correspondents inform a plain 

 unlettered farmer, where he can find ' gas ammo- 

 niacal liquor," or a substitute for it? Landreth in 

 his edition of Johnson's Dictionary of Gardening, 

 directs, under the aiticle "Weeds" & peck (?) of 

 salt and a gallon of the above, added to a barrow 

 load ol weeds, and the whole immediately (?) be- 

 comes a saponaceous mass. It appears strange to 

 me that Mr. Landreth, knowing, as he must know, 

 that gas ammoniacal liquor is not to be had by one 

 farmer in a thousand in this country, had not ex- 



