1880.] 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



241 



of Doylestown, as we learn from the Bucks 

 County, Pa., Intelligencer. A good remedy is 

 much needed. 



Apple Trade. — It is hard to decide which way 

 the current of trade flows. The California papers 

 of last winter had glowing accounts of successful 

 and profitable shipments of apples to California ; 

 and now we have in London papers accounts of 

 the "successful importation of one hundred 

 boxes of apples from Adelaide by steamer Lusi- 

 tania." It is hard to see what the apple wants 

 to be thus wandering all around the world. 



Artificial Water in Gardens. — Whenever 

 we have heard people deride Colorado because 

 they have to depend on irrigation for moat of the 

 water for their growing crops, we have thought 

 that it would not be bad for eastern growers to 

 have at command artificial conveniences. Straw- 

 berry growers eait would have found a wind-mill 

 for a water pump a paying investment for straw- 

 berry beds the past May. They were nearly 

 ruined by the May drouth. Those who could 

 have commanded a Colorado ditch would have 

 made a fortune. 



Standard Gooseberries. — It is now some years 

 since the idea of grafting gooseberries was first 

 introduced to the attention of American horti- 

 culturists by Mr. Bulot through our pages. The 

 subsequent experience with the foreign plants at 

 the Centennial led to the belief that on this stock 

 they might be free from mildew, and we might 

 have the foreign varieties in our gardens in all 

 their luscious English perfection. But we have 

 not heard of any trials with them. We under- 

 stood Mr. Hooker was to take it in hand. What 

 has he to say about them ? 



CR.ACKED Pears. — Who ever has had anything 

 to do with pears must have noticed how con 

 fused are the ideas of writers about pear diseases. 

 We read of " pear blight," and " cracked pears," 

 the writer evidently not recognizing that there 

 are many distinct things under these names. 

 Take cracking. That which we often see in the 

 Giffard or the Beurre Diel is very difierent from 

 that which we see in the St. Germain or the 

 White Doyenne ; and we must note these ditier- 

 ences if we would reach a true idea of cause and 

 cure. While a cracked Beurre Giffard may be 

 had from a tree apparently with healthy growth, 

 the White Doyenne and St. Germain trees 

 always show a stunted growth. We have had a 

 St. Germain tree before our eyes annually for 



ten years, but never saw an annual growth of 

 over six inches, and yet the tree stands by itself 

 in very rich ground, where there is no reason 

 why it might not make some shoots of a foot or 

 two at least. Besides, that there is no defect in 

 the opportunities for nutrition is evidenced by 

 the dark green foliage. If the tree did not grow 

 from poverty, it would have yellow and not 

 green foliage. So with White Doyennes under 

 similar circumstances. The leaves are always of 

 a healthy green, but it would puzzle the propa- 

 gator to get any sticks fit for budding from a 

 crack-fruited pear tree. This fact should be 

 borne in mind by those studying the diseases of 

 the pear. 



We have often heard that there is no such 

 cracking known in the Old World, but we have 

 from time to time shown that this is a mistake. 

 If any further evidence be required, the follow- 

 ing from the Gardener's Record may supply it: 

 "A tree of White Doyenne pear, which had 

 borne nothing but worthless, cracked fruit for 

 years, had, three years ago, all its upper branches 

 grafted with Autumn Bergamot, and the lower 

 branches of the White Doyenne were su ffered to 

 remain. The growth of the Autumn Bergamot 

 has been very strong, and their strength has 

 been evidently communicated to the stock 

 several inches below the point of union. On 

 one of these branches a sprout of Marie Louise, 

 growing just below the point of union, had been 

 overlooked in the grafting, and the shoots bore 

 jast year clean, perfect fruit, all the rest of the 

 tree being cracked and worthless as heretofore. 

 The most probable influence in accounting for 

 this is, that this shoot had received its condi- 

 tions of health from the Autumn Bergamot 

 shoot above it.' 



Paper from Grass. — The Irish papers are urg- 

 ing the feasibility of planting the Purple Melic 

 Grass — Melica purpurea — on the bogs of Ireland, 

 in order to encourage the extensive manufacture 

 of paper. 



Edible Earth. — We find the following in an 

 English paper: "Dr. Lowe, Nevv York, has 

 recently tested a sample of earth eaten by the 

 Ainos, or aborigines of Japan. Several pounds 

 of the earth are mixed with the bulbs of Japan- 

 ese lilies and boiled into a thick soup, which is 

 reputed very palatable by the Ainos. Dr. Lowe 

 finds it to be a silicious earth, in composition 

 closely resembling other earths eaten in Java 

 and in Lapland. It contains less than one per 



