1883.] 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



17 



common sorts will not do when you can have them 

 ni bearing in three or four years." 



The " Earlikst of All " Pea.— There have 

 been " Early " peas, and " Extra Early," and per- 

 haps " Double Extras," but now Mr. Saxton has 

 raised one he calls " Earliest of All." As the 

 patriot says of his flag, " long may it wave." Still 

 we fear there will be some still earlier, for during 

 the past two hundred years the interval from the 

 sowing in February or March to the gathering in 

 May or June, has not yet been bridged. There has 

 been, to be sure, an "early six weeks," but why 

 not an " early six days ? " 



Flax in Mexico. — Mexico is progressing rap- 

 idly, and our exchanges show that numberless in- 

 dustries are being earnestly nurtured. Flax cul- 



ture is receiving attention. In an article before us 

 the " Dodder" is classed among "insects injurious 

 to flax" — not a bad "idea, for Dodder, though a 

 plant, aftects other plants much as an insect would. 



White Elephant Potato.— Cuts on English 

 circulars represent this as about the size of an old- 

 time plantation negro's foot. Large vegetables are 

 often more curious than profitable, but those who 

 have to scratch for a living, find much more weight 

 in a bushel of large than a bushel of small pota- 

 toes. 



Feast's Scuffle Cultivator. — This vigorous 

 contrivance, first cuts up the weeds, and then by a 

 roller fork behind, shakes out all the earth from 

 the uprooted weeds, by which they are laid cut so 

 as to soon dry up. 



Forestry. 



EDITORIAL NOTES. 



Forestry in America. — It is rather surprising 

 that while you may find a hundred men who will 

 write and talk that " something should be done" to 

 increase our forest area, scarcely one looks at the 

 matter practically, to see what can be done, and 

 endeavor to aid those who are actually trying to 

 do something. Such men as Sargent, Warder and 

 Douglas, deserve much more respect from their 

 countrymen than they have hitherto received. 

 They look closely into the actual details of Ameri- 

 can forestry, and spread the information necessary 

 to set people practically to work to remedy what 

 may in the future be a short timber supply. One 

 may talk till he is hoarse about the patriotism 

 which should plant trees because in a couple of 

 centuries the land will be a desert if they be not 

 planted, when he could get a thousand-acre plot 

 started by a ten-minute talk with one who could see 

 some immediate interest therein. He may write a 

 learned essay elucidating what European govern- 

 ments are doing in the way of planting forests, and 

 yet not take five minutes to remember what is best 

 to be done in a country where every man is, or 

 desires to be, a king. 



To our mind there is little more needed in our 

 country, than practical knowledge, in order to 



encourage forest planting. Sargent has made it 

 plain to us just where the forests are. There is 

 yet a good stock in some places, provided we can 

 get railroads profitably to the locations before they 

 rot away. W^arder has indicated what trees will 

 grow rapidly, and make profitable timber in less 

 than a very short lifetime, but beyond all Douglas 

 has demonstrated what it will actually cost to plant 

 forests, and is willing to go to any part of the 

 United States, and for stipulated figures, to either 

 plant and stop, or to engage to care for the planta- 

 tion for several years. In order that we might 

 write this paragraph understandingly, we asked 

 Mr. Douglas to give us some facts. The letter he 

 sends us is a private one, but in the interest of 

 forestry culture we believe he will not object to our 

 giving the following extract : 



"We plant this section for the railroad company. 

 They pay the actual cost of breaking and cross- 

 plowing the prairie, which costs $4 an acre. We 

 prepare the land, furnish the trees, plant them four 

 by four feet, and grow them till they are four to six 

 feet high, and shade the ground till they require a 

 further care or cultivation, and are to deliver 2,000 

 trees four to six feet high on each acre, for which 

 we receive $30 per acre. In taking contracts for 

 the future we will charge $j per acre for breaking 

 and cross-plowing the land, as the cost of getting 

 the teams together, seeing that it is properly done, 

 measuring for the different plowmen, paying them, 



