ISII.Ji 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



189 



Those Rascally Seedsmen. — We find the fol- 

 lowing letter from a sufferer in the Gander- 

 mvamp (0.) Slatesman. We understand that the 

 gentleman, who was so fearfully swindled, en- 

 couraged by recent legal decisions in New 

 Jersey and elsewhere, does not intend to suffer 

 the matter to rest here, but has engaged our 

 horticultural friend Judge Frank of Dayton, 

 to see him righted in the matter. We may look 

 for lively times. 



Mr. Editor: — I bought from Mr. the 



finest and rarest varieties of flower seeds I found 

 described in his catalogue. 



I made a hot-bed four feet thick of fresh, loose 

 manure, placed fine earth over it, composed 

 mostly of decayed cowdung and chicken manure. 

 It was black and rich, and seed having any vi- 

 tality at all would surely germinate in such soil. 

 I sowed my seed in this bed and covered it about 

 four inches deep with a composition made of 

 one-third of the fine earth aforesaid, one-third of 

 bone-dust and one-third of Peruvian guano. 

 The heat of my hot-bed was splendid — hot 

 enough to boil water. 



I saturated thoroughly three times each d&y to 

 encourage the seeds to do well. You say seeds 

 should never be allowed to become dry after 

 they are sown. I watched my hot-beds very 

 attentively daily, anxiously looking for the seeds 

 to come up in luxuriant growth. I was already 

 seeing them in imagination at my dooryard, 

 blooming in a sea of glory next Stimmer. 



I really thought my heart would break when, 

 after long days and weary weeks of watching, 

 not a flower seed came up. At the same time 

 when I sowed my flower seed I also sow^ed some 

 cabbage seed into my hot-bed. The cabbage 

 seed sprouted a few days after it was sowed, but 

 it grew up at the rate of two-forty, spindling like 

 a darning needle. The plants could not stand up 

 straight. They gracefully hung their heads down 

 to the ground like stalks of Indian corn in Sum- 

 mer after a severe storm, showing that the cab- 

 bage seed must have been sickly when I got it, 

 and that the flower seed was as dead as a door- 

 nail before it was sent to me. 



Oh, for a modern Attila, who would be a 

 scourge of nurserymen and seedsmen, who would 

 kill all the swindling nurserymen and seedsmen, 

 together with their families, and their relatives 

 to the fifteenth degree. 



I do not believe that a drop of honest blood 

 would be harmed if all the nurserymen and 



seedsmen and all their friends and relations were 

 indiscriminately slaughtered, and their heads 

 used to build pyramids in Tamerlane's fashion 

 of old, as a terrible and lasting warning to all 

 rascals. 



You may say that I am excited; that I am 

 mad. I say, yes; I am excited; I am mad; and 

 I have every reason to be so. It is well for 

 these villians that I am not in possession of witch- 

 craft, for woe be unto them if I were. I do think 

 it is too provoking to be swindled and victimized 

 year after year by a set of thieves and plunder- 

 ers. But enough of this sad chapter. I do 

 neither ask nor expect any advice from you in 

 this matter, because there is none to give; but it 

 relieves my bleeding heart, and throbbing, aching 

 temples to know that you share my grief by 

 knowing of it. This world would be a paradise 

 to us if we were spared the agonies given us by 

 dishonest nurserymen and seedsmen. As it is, it 

 is " a vale of tears — dead." 



ToRNiLLA. — In the published reports of the 

 meeting of the Linnsen Society of London it is 

 said the Strombocarpus pubescens of New 

 Mexico is called, by the natives, Retorquilla, it 

 should be Tornilla, we think. 



A Dahlia Catalogue. — It puts us in mind of 

 some thirty years ago, to see a beautifully gotten 

 up catalogue wholly on Dahlias! It is from Mr. 

 Max Deegan Junior the second, and from Kos- 

 tritz in Thuringia, and we really think the 

 Dahlia deserves more than the cool treatment it 

 has had of late years. Mr. Deegan grows only 

 Dahlias, having given up all other branches of 

 the floral business for them. Such devotion 

 deserves reward. 



How TO Raise Fruit. — A hand-book of fruit 

 culture, by Thomas Gregg, New York, S. R . 

 Wells & Co., from J. B. Lippincott & Co., Phila - 

 delphia. Every year there are large numbers of 

 little books issued from the pi-ess on this and 

 kindred subjects, which are evidently not intend- 

 ed for those who have made much advance in 

 horticultural knowledge, and which are aimed at, 

 and really do reach many who rarely or neve r 

 see more advanced publications. It would 

 hardly be fair to apply the same rules of criti- 

 cism to these as to more pretentious works. They 

 do a great deal of good in their way, and we 

 were glad to see that there is a demand and a 

 good use for them. Mr. Greeg's book is quite as 



