18T6.J 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



349 



successful agricultural colleges ; and it is a pleas- 

 ure to read what it has to say of itself. Dr. Abbot 

 is President, and R. G. Baird, Secretary, Prof. 



Kedzie, of Chemistry, Beal, of Botany, and Cook 

 of Zoology and Entomology, are well known to 

 our readers. 



IMORTICULTURAL fSoCIETIES. 



EDITORIAL NOTES. 



The Centennial. — By the time this reaches 

 most of our readers, the great Exhibition will 

 have closed ; and we shall soon be in a position 

 to see what gain, if any, has accrued to Agricul- 

 ture and Horticulture — the last of which it is our 

 especial business to deal with. 



So far as the fruit and vegetable department is 

 concerned, our readers have been tolerably well 

 informed through copies of the reports of the 

 Judges made from week to week, and which have 

 been kindly placed at the disposal of the Press 

 by the Centennial Commission. We have not 

 been able to give all these reports on account of 

 the length of some of them, and the reference 

 occasionally to matters from distant parts of 

 the earth, that, however interesting to the peo- 

 ple of those districts, could hardly be of service 

 to the majority of our readers. The awards 

 which will be made on the strength of these re- 

 ports may perhaps tell more in time than these 

 reports do now. 



We cannot but think that it was a mistake not 

 to do for Horticulture proper what the Agricul- 

 tural Department did for fruits and vegetables. 

 A continuous floral exhibition, would have been 

 a great charm. This week pansies, and other 

 things in season — next week geraniums, then 

 rhododendrons, then roses, then leaf plants for 

 bedding, then gladiolus, and so on down to chry- 

 santhemums ; and not limiting the exhibition 

 to anything named, but allowing any thing to be 

 brought that was beautiful, and rewarding it ac- 

 cording to its merits by an honorable mention in 

 a, report, as well as by a special medal and diplo- 

 ma at the close, in those cases where special 

 merit was exemplified in the article exhibited. 



Horticulture has gained a little by the Centen- 

 nial E.Khibition. It has exhibited good lessons in 

 landscape gardening, in arranging bedding plants, 

 and in arboriculture — in any other respect the 

 great world, which in numbers ranging from near 

 iifty thousand to two hundred and fifty thousand 



a day visited the Exposition, knows little more 

 than if the Exposition had never been held.* 



To Messrs. Such, Dick, and Williams of Eng- 

 land, who at a great expense in personal atten- 

 dance, kept collections of rare plants in the 

 building all the season, Horticulture in America 

 owes a debt of gratitude, and the special exhibit 

 of Rhododendrons is entitled to no less praise. 

 The points we have named are the chief redeem- 

 ing features in one huge blank. Where the 

 blame for this huge failure rests we have no dis- 

 position to investigate, and it would serve no 

 good purpose now. We only know that a Cen- 

 tennial Horticultural Society was organized, and 

 hoped to do something. The Centennial Com- 

 mission hoped to do something. The Chief of the 

 Bureau hoped, and we know, tried to bring these 

 good things about. ITie Penna. Horticultural 

 Society was no less earnest in its efforts to have » 

 Horticulture well sustained. We have heard 

 many reasons given why they all failed, and to a 

 certain extent there seems good ground in every 

 case to account for the failure. All we have to 

 do is with " the facts of history," and these un- 

 varnished facts tell simply that while in Pomol- 

 ogy we have been able to get a fair idea from the 

 Centennial as to what fruit-growers are doing, in 

 Horticulture we have not. 



Philadelphia, Sept. 28th, 1876. 

 Hon. a. T. Goshorn, Director General U. S. Cen- 

 tennial Commission. 



Sir : — Daring the past week we have examined 

 a collection of the native fruits of the Philippine 

 Islands, exhibited by the " Inspector of Woods 

 and Forests " in the Spanish pavilion. This is a 

 particularly valuable contribution to the ex- 

 hibition, making us for the first time acquainted 

 with the indigenous pomological products of 

 these Islands. There are 97 kinds in all, some 

 of them, of course, of little more value than the 

 wild berries of other countries, but many are re- 

 garded as of superior excellence. The following 

 appear to be among the most striking, the bot- 

 anical names being given as being more intellig- 



