178 



THE GARDENERS' MONTHLY 



[June, 



If he had thinned half, he would have had to sell 

 for fifty cents each, instead of twenty-five cents, to 

 make the same money. It is doubtful if he could 

 have sold all the pears at fifty cents each, no mat- 

 ter how good they might have been. Mr. Satter- 

 thwaite took the right view, but it is folly to take 

 such experiments as the true test of the eating 

 quality of the Kieffer pear. 



Early Bearing Pear Trees. — " L. J.," Cin- 

 cinnati, Ohio, writes : " I have a small garden 

 from which we sell considerable vegetables and 

 small fruits, and which, being left a widow with a 

 young family, has helped to support me pretty 

 well. I have no large fruit trees on the place, but 

 two pear trees, one of which is a Seckel, and the 

 other is just coming into bearing, and, I am told, 

 is the Tyson. They are between twelve and 



fifteen years old. From what I can judge by the 

 little experience I have had, I think I could make 

 a little on some good late fall pears, and am 

 thinking of setting out say two dozen this fall. I 

 think the best will be better for me than a number 

 of varieties. But the two I have have been so 

 long coming into bearing, I thought to ask your 

 advice. What two kinds would you advise me to 

 take, that are first-rate fall pears, and not so long 

 before they bear ?" 



[Try .Bartlett and Sheldon.— Ed. G. M.] 



Highland Beauty Apple. — We have some 

 specimens before us, on the 9th of April, in good 

 preservation. They confirm the opinion we have 

 given of it heretofore — that it is a pretty looking 

 apple, an excellent keeper, though by no means a 

 first class eating variety. 



Forestry. 



EDITORIAL NOTES. 



Spare the Forests. — The Michigan Farmer 

 presents the foUov/ing excellent bit of common 

 sense in regard to the common newspaper cry of, 

 " Spare the Forests:" "Of what use is a forest if 

 you do not utilize it ? It produces nothing, and 

 prevents anything else from being produced. Cut 

 it down and turn it into cash, and in its place grow 

 crops that will feed the people and enrich the 

 grower. If timber is wanted, grow it as you would 

 any other crop, and when it is ready to cut put it 

 in market with as little compunction as you would 

 a crop of wheat. Let us look at this question in a 

 practical way, and do away with such sickly senti- 

 mentality ?" 



Floods and Forests. — The great number of 

 marked papers and essays sent us on forestry 

 shows the widespread interest in it. Before us is 

 a Boston paper with a two-column article, sug- 

 gested by the late floods in the Ohio and Missis- 

 sippi. It says : 



"We have continuous reports from the West of 

 overflows and inundations, destruction of city 

 property and farming lands, loss of life and ruin 

 of the finances of many, all of which is a blight 

 on our prosperity. The reason why has been 

 sought, and the conclusions of many are that the 



indiscriminate and lawless manner in which our 

 forests are felled from the mountains, hills and val- 

 leys is the true cause for these incredible flows of 

 water in such immense quantities and at one time. 

 It is argued, and it seems with reason, that a 

 mountain side, when wooded, prevents the sudden 

 melting of the snows and ice, which cause our 

 freshets; that the dissolution is more regular; 

 whereas, when exposed to the full rays of the sun 

 and to the rains, there can be no doubt that the 

 snows and ice melt with greater rapidity." 



All of which is but another illustration of the 

 point we often make, that impractical people can 

 write for an hour about that which five minutes of 

 practical experience would dispel. Everybody 

 except chronic "writers on forestry" knows that 

 the recent floods came from very heavy and warm 

 rains pouring down on a deep deposit of snow, and 

 that a warm rain will melt snow under trees just 

 as rapidly as it will melt it out in the open. 

 The "full rays of the sun" had nothing to do with 

 these Western floods. But there is little chance of 

 the crop of such essayists melting away. 



Destruction of Forests in Mississippi. — 

 The town of Wesson, in Mississippi, was struck by 

 a cyclone on the 23d of April, and the pine forests 

 in the vicinity utterly uprooted, as well as the 

 houses destroyed. Wesson is to be sympathized 

 with. It was one of the first places in the South 



