HOW TO RENOVATE AN OUTCAST. 



225 



great thorny plant upon the car or chariot, 

 which was to transport it to Vera Cruz, the 

 nearest seaport. The weight of this re- 

 markable specimen was about four hundred 

 pounds. 



Mr. Staine describes these Cacti as grow- 

 ing in deep ravines, among masses of rocks 

 situated in the high mountains of Mexico. 

 The finest specimens are in places where 

 it is impossible to reach them with a car- 

 riage, and it is done with difficulty even on 

 horseback. Some of them, which he mea- 

 sured, were nine or ten feet in height. 

 When we reflect how slowly this family of 

 succulent plants grow, there is little doubt 

 that these gigantic specimens of Mexican 

 Cacti are some of them several hundred 

 years old. 



The Cactus tribe, as such of our readers 

 as arc familiar with Mexican products are 

 aware, is not a family of plants merely cu- 

 rious to the botanist or plant collector. On 

 one of the species, C. cochi7iillifera, the 

 Cochineal insect feeds, that insect which 

 produces the splendid scarlet dye, so well 

 known in commerce. Mexico has the en- 

 tire monopoly of this product, and the fer- 

 tile district of Oaxaca is that in which it is 

 chiefly cultivated. Some idea of the value 

 of this little red insect, apparently so insig- 

 nificant, may be obtained, when we men- 

 tion that the annual export of it now 

 amounts to above one million of dollars, and, 

 according to Humboldt, two millions dol- 

 lars worth of it have been exported in a sin- 

 gle year. 



HOW TO RENOVATE AN "OUTCAST.' 



BY J. B. W., NEW- YORK. 



It is very rarely that experiments are pro- 

 perly made or accurately reported. The 

 following one, on a subject highly interest- 

 mg to every cultivator of the Pear tree on 

 the sea-board, appears to us highly satisfac- 

 tory in both respects. 



Such of our readers as are familiar with 

 the Appendix to our work on Fruits, are 

 well aware that we do not believe in the 

 natural " running out " of varieties. In 

 other Avords, we are confident that wher- 

 ever a variety, once productive and excellent 

 in a certain soil, fails, it is for the want of 

 certain conditions necessary to its success. 

 Either it has exhausted the soil of those 

 constituents necessary to health and pro- 

 ductiveness ; or, if the tree is a young one, 

 and immediately shows signs of decay, it 

 is evident that it has been propagated from 

 an unhealthy and diseased stock. 

 29 



The hints we ga\'e our correspondent be- 

 low, were based on some chemical notions, 

 which were only vague theory then, but 

 which subsequent observations have given 

 us greater confidence in. The renovating 

 substances that we recommended in this 

 case, were intended to be adapted to the 

 peculiarities of the soil of J. B. W. ; but all 

 the alteration which we are able, even now, 

 to suggest for other sites, would be to sub- 

 stitute air-slaked lime for charcoal, in hea- 

 vier soils, that are naturally deficient in the 

 former substance. 



The salts of iron, and especially sulphate 

 of iron, has a specific action upon the dis- 

 ease which attacks, in unfavorable soil or 

 climate, the epidermis of the pear and other 

 plants, both on the leaf and fruit. Obser- 

 vations of the occasional results of black- 

 smith's cinders, applied to this tree, in va- 



