For Muy. 1922 



159 



of seed or number of plants to the acre, time of sowing or plant- 

 ing, yields, together with very brief statements of the most im- 

 portant diseases and insects. The condensed paragraphs on the 

 maladies and pests are prepared especially for this edition of the 

 book, all on a uniform pattern. 



The treatment just outlined, occupies about two-thirds of this 

 compactly and neatly made volume of nearly 500 pages; the las. 

 third IS given up to an exceedingly valuable and up-to-date presen- 

 tation of Glass, the Land and Its Treatment, Vegetable-gardening 

 Tools and Implements; Seeds and Seedagc, Other Management 

 of the \ egetable-Garden. Marketing. Storing, Drving and the 

 Home Garden. 



Xlt (iRowiXG, by Robert T. Morris, .\1. D. The .Macmillan 

 Company, Xew York. 



Several considerations make this well-written volume one of the 

 most \aluable works that have appeared in the lield of horticulture 

 in a long time. As^ it points out, nut trees of many kinds can 

 supply all the protein, oils and vitamines belonging to the meat 

 group of foods. But it is questionable if the author is warranted 

 m declaring, as he does, that "were wheat, corn, and rice and other 

 grains to be suddenly stricken from the earth, man might live bet- 

 ter than ever before," for nuts are a very concentrated food, not 

 absorbed by weak digestions and always best eaten with a bulkier 

 food made from grains or vegetables, salted crackers being one of 

 the superior concomitants. Hence the doctor's remarks concerning 

 the part that nuts should play in allaying the fears of those who 

 believe that the world is in danger of becoming over-populated are 

 themselves to be "taken with a grain of salt."' Yet his discussion 

 of the Malthusian doctrine and of various checks to over-popula- 

 tion is interesting and embraces reflections that economists would 

 do well to ponder over more than they do. 



That it is true that much land now waste could be made very 

 productive is suggested by Doctor Morris' affirming that in the 

 state of his residence, Connecticut, nearly half the land is not tilled 

 and yet ought to bear nuts of more value than the food grown 

 upon the land now tilled, while over the country generally much 

 swampy land, some of which is drained at great expense, could be 

 made to yield edible nuts from various water plants. The market 

 value of nuts already grown commercially in this country has 

 mounted to enormous figures. Of the over $57,000,000 paid for 

 importations, a large part could be kept in this country, while jt is 

 true also that as nuts become more appreciated, the kinds that can- 

 not be grown in this country will undoubtedly be brought in in 

 larger quantities. Nuts are being more and more appreciated and 

 more trees arc annually being planted even to serve partly as 

 shade or ornament ; for one thing, because they root so deeply, 

 they permit the planting of undergrowth in landscape adornment 

 as do not the shade and ornamental trees that are planted com- 

 monly. One particular tree, the Lancaster Heart Nut. introduced 

 by J. F. Jones, of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, of robust growth, has 

 "\ery large, almost tropical-looking foliage and quickly makes a 

 striking and very beautiful specimen on the lawn or in the home 

 grounds." 



To meet the rapidly increasing demand many nurserymen have 

 been supplying" seeding trees, against which the book advises that 

 they are greatly inferior to those propagated by grafts from tree-, 

 of known excellence. For grafting is advocated a new method. 

 It consists in covering the entire scion, as well as the wound in 

 the stock, with melted paraffine, hardened slightly, if need be, with 

 stearic acid. The theory is that while black or brown or amber 

 wax halts the actinic rays of light, which promote the activity of 

 bud chlorophyl, the paraffine allows the actinic rays to act upon 

 the chlorophyl in the bud and in the bark of the s?ion and does 

 not attract the destructive heat rays ; it thus further, by covering 

 the scion completely and shutting out the air,. maintains sap tension 

 equally throughout the fluctuations of negative and positive pres- 

 sure caused by changes in light and temperature, prevents evapora- 

 tion of the scion and prevents suberization ; that is, the natural 

 spread of a corky layer over the wound surface between the stock 

 and the scion, and which forms a mechanical obstacle to union. 

 This new method permits of iniinrdiatr grafting, — the cutting of 

 a scion directly from one tree and placing it at once upon another 

 tree at almost any time during the Summer, But one of the most 

 successful nut tree propagators regards Summer grafting as com- 

 mercially impracticable and declares that one usually cannot get 

 growth, and if one does get growth it does not mature. He still 

 prefers also to use a heavy black wax, which trial has convinced 

 him equals the paraffine, and even secures a covering that is better 

 and takes half the time to apply. His men do better jobs with the 

 dark wax, for when they use paraffine they cannot easily see when 

 all the cuts are covered. The wax. furthermore, stays on from 

 one year to the next, regardless of the weather. 



A more questionable point in the book is the advocacv of severe 

 pruning of the roots in transplanting. The grower iust referred 

 to strongly recommends, after extensive experimentation, that 

 while the tops should be cut back almost mercilessly, the root sys- 

 tem slv. uld be kept as nearly entire as possible. 



One important matter omitted is a discussion of the handling of 

 the nuts when they are gathered, for the quality is greatly im- 

 proved by proper curing. All nuts should have the husks re- 

 moved as soon as they are gathered and they should then be 

 promptly dried out, for the tannin in the husks darkens the pellicle 

 of the kernel and afTects its taste. 



Attention might have been called to the fact, also, that in cold 

 climates nut trees often fail, not because of their not being hardy, 

 but because of an aphid feeding upon the leaves, from which it 

 passes to the twigs. The twigs then become pithy and are easily 

 killed back in Winter. The Persian, or so-called English walnut, 

 notably sufifers in this way, while certain strains of it kept in 

 health are hardy even as far north as southeastern Canada, not, 

 however, in Minnesota, northern Iowa, Dakota and Wisconsin. 

 But the book contains a complete and satisfactory treatment of the 

 different kinds of nuts and directs in the obtaining of detailed in- 

 formation, also. It concludes with twenty-nine carefully executed 

 drawings illustrating the processes of grafting. — F. B, M. 



Trl^lv Rl;r,\i., by Richardson Wright. Houghton Mifflin Com- 

 pany, Boston. 



The publishers' own commendation of this entertaining little 

 book is perfectly just: "A man and his wife (a most charming 

 man, with a delightful wife) buy an old country house and under- 

 take its rejuvenation. There are chapters about the fine art of 

 breakfasting and rearranging of closets, lovely interior vistas of 

 an old colonial stairway or a perfect dining-room, or outside 

 orchards and radiant gardens. There are many suggestions in 

 this little book which will be of value for all who love houses and 

 gardens, and much valuable information. And all readers, with a 

 grain of the proud householder in their blood, will ache at least to 

 rearrange their furniture or go out in the garden and dig." 



The qualities that make Mr. Wright, who, by the way, is the 

 editor of House and Garden, a "charming man,"' are those that 

 have made so perennially charming the old Roman Horace, — genial 

 and philosophic contentment and a vein of playful sarcasm that 

 helps people, in spite of their shamming, whether voluntarily as- 

 sumed or forced upon them, to find the verities of life. His 

 chapter on Annuals, racy and yet properly appreciative, blandly 

 declares that "American landscaping suffers at present from a seri- 

 ous attack of Naturalizitis. Wild gardening and massed shrub- 

 bery and tree-moving are its present-day passions. Its ideal is to 

 hedge in the view and make one thing blend into another. Be- 

 cause of this the herbaceous border has lost some of its profes- 

 sional popularity and the annual garden is looked upon as the 

 vagary of an unknowing mind." Some people, he declares, "make 

 a garden because it is the fashionable thing to do ; other people 

 take gardening the way they would take a narcotic (the way some 

 men take work) — to make themselves forget the bitter realities of 

 life — still others make gardens because it is part of a fuU life." 

 These last are the successful gardeners, the born gardeners, whom 

 the author sympathetically analyses. — F. B. M. 



The Apple Tree, by Liberty Hyde Bailey. The Macmillan 

 Company, New York. 



It is to be hoped that the booklets to follow in the series intro- 

 duced by this one will succecxl as well as does this in the aim of 

 being genial. But it has other merits besides that of being per- 

 fectly adapted to promote a friendly feeling toward the apple tree. 

 That it has a mission along this line is evident from the fact that 

 in this country, despite all the urging to plant trees, the number 

 of trees bearing this most healthful fruit has decreased, within the 

 past ten years, in seven of the leading apple-growing states, from 

 65,200,000 to only 37,100,000. 



The little book is delightful reading. It comes near being an 

 idyl ; in parts it is actually poetical, and in one place, extolling the 

 fruit, it is almost lyrical. It is scholarly,— no work bearing the 

 name of Professor Bailey could be otherwise. It skillfully con- 

 trives to impart, along with interesting history, narrative and de- 

 lightful description, all within its small compass, fairly complete 

 iiistructions for planting and caring for the trees also. The chap- 

 ter devoted to The Dwarf Apple-Tree, though brief, is particularly 

 commendable for its telling so plainly the truth about a subject 

 too little understood bv perhaps the majority of gardeners and 

 owners of homes. How many, for example, know^ that the apple, 

 more than any other fruit tree, 'roots from the scion if this is in 

 contact with the earth and that for this reason the dwarf apple 

 tree must not be set with the union beneath the surface of the 

 ground ? 



It is not intended to be a handbook for the commercial grower. 

 In accomplishing the purpose for which it is intended it seems to 

 come a trifle short only in the list of varieties recommended for 

 dififerent parts of the country. This list is far from being up to 

 date, as Professor Bailey himself remarks.^-F. B. M. 



