CRITIQUE ON MARCH HORTICULTURIST. 



[We are iniicli pleased witli tliis article, and gratified to record such success 

 with a fruit that l)aflU's the most cxiicricnccd. And yet there are instances, in 

 our own neighborhood, which have had sufficient influence with us to induce 

 planting more Apricot-trees every year ; so far, our results have been half a dozen 

 good sized fruits per annum. In the garden of J. Francis Fisher, Esq., there are, 

 or were, lately, two specimens of the size of large apple-trees ; they produced, 

 annually, many bushels of perfect Apricots that were untouched by the eurculio, 

 and yet received no cultivation whatever. If the suggestions of our correspondent 

 are carried out, we may yet hope. — Eix] 



CRITIQUE OX THE MARCU HORTICULTURIST. 



Illinois and the Prairies. — "A wonderful country" is Illinois, and the States 

 which lie around it — incomprehensible, too, to those who have never seen the broad 

 territory they cover. Great efforts are making by the earnest men therein, to 

 develop the untold wealth which lies buried in their soils. Vast are the prairies, 

 too, and all the worse that they are so. A sprinkling of " rocks, trees, and run- 

 ning brooks" over their vast surfaces would make them abundantly richer in the 

 elements of agricultural life, and save — oh, how much of man's brief time, weary 

 labor, and anxious solicitude in planting trees, and pumping water I Doctor 

 Kennicott's Transactions is a commendable work, highly creditable to his own 

 industry and research, and full of promise to the future usefulness of the Illinois 

 State Society, and as your remarks, Mr. Editor, express all I have to say on 

 that subject, I have a word or two for the managers of that useful institution. 

 I learn that they have heretofore pursued a quite mistaken policy, in docking the 

 pay of their tcorking secretaries — the very men, in fact, to whose brain labor they 

 are chiefly indebted for the good show they make in the getting up of these valu- 

 able Transactions. 



Now, gentlemen managers, this won't do. If you mean to have a society use- 

 ful to the people, and creditable to the agriculture of your State, you must have 

 an office at your seat of government for the depository of its papers, documents, 

 library, and Transactions, with a living, thinking, writing, talking man inside of 

 it — call him secretary, or what you like — as the New Yorkers do at Albany, to 

 attend to its business, and communicate with the farmers of your State on all 

 subjects appertaining to their agricultural advancement. And beyond this, you 

 must pay him a salary sufficient to compensate his time and labor. Brains are 

 not in the habit of working for nothing, unless there is a soft spot in them. In 

 that office should be the annual and other meetings of your society — the general 

 agricultural head-quarters of the State. Your great, big State cattle shows are 

 all verj well, but they should be only an incident, or high holiday of the year, 

 showing the results of your annual progress. Illinois is purely an agricultural 

 State, wide in territory, and probably, the fourth in population and agricultural 



