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HORTICULTURE 



June 28, 1919 



Edwardsville, 111., June 19, 1919. 

 Dear Editor: — 



I am interested in your editorial and 

 the comments on shorter hours for 

 florists, in the June 14th issue of your 

 journal. 



For the last fifteen years our green- 

 house men have worked only nine 

 hours a day, with no Sunday work 

 except cutting stock and very neces- 

 sary watering, and with Saturday 

 afternoons off during summer months. 



While in the retail business we ran 

 as other local merchants — 7 a. m. to 

 6 p. m., and on Saturday to 9 p. m.; 

 but no Sunday sales whatever. We 

 always had Sunday funerals, but all 

 our flowers were delivered on Satur- 



day evening for them, and we had no 

 complaint at all to speak of. 



The trouble is that we watch the 

 other fellow too much; it's just up to 

 each individual himself. I say close 

 on Sunday by all means, for your own 

 sake, your family's sake, your em- 

 ployees' sake, and in reverence to your 

 God. 



I am indeed glad the sentiment of 

 shorter hours for all employers as 

 well as employees is growing. Begin- 

 ning July 1 we shall go on an eight- 

 hour schedule, and I am sure all will 

 be better pleased. 



Let's all adopt the great universal 

 American custom of an eight-hour 

 day's work. 



Success to your worthy movement. 

 J. F. Ammann. 



A Curious Twist of Facts About Laurel 



By E. H. Wilson. 



If anyone doubted that mountain 

 laurel, the state flower, known to 

 botanists as Kalmia, was in blossom at 

 this time, he should have watched 

 the procession of automobiles late on 

 Sunday afternoon along any of the 

 trunk lines of the State. One man, 

 who had curiously regarded the mat- 

 ter, counted forty cars bearing the 

 blossoms passing his home in thirty 

 minutes, this being on only one of the 

 several country roads running through 

 the country in which this blossom is 

 found. 



Though Kalmia is the State flower, 

 officially recognized by act of the Leg- 

 islature, Section 6275 of the Revised 

 Statutes is so worded as to permit au- 

 tomobilists and other lovers of the 

 flower to gather it at their pleasure, 

 assuming that they do not gather it 

 for sale. If they attempt to do that 

 and are caught at it and cannot show 

 that they gathered it with the permis- 

 sion of the owners of the land upon 

 which it grew they are liable to vari- 

 ous penalties of an unpleasant sort 

 No one gathered it on Sunday, we as- 

 sume, with any such sordid aim. 



The law has its uses, but even with- 

 out it one feels that the supply of Kal- 

 mia in this state will not be exhausted, 

 for, while it has a marked liking for 

 rocky woodlands along the shore, it is 

 even more common in northern and 

 central Connecticut. The shrub is 

 beautiful when in bloom, but no 

 farmer appreciates its beauty, for he 

 realizes that it is not a product of 

 really valuable land. It will form, if 

 left to its own devices, an impenetra- 

 ble thicket and though left to itself, 



until the end of time it will not de- 

 velop into wood or into lumber. Hard 

 and close-grained its wood is indeed, 

 but it fails to grow to a size which 

 makes it of value. 



It is long lived and grips the terri- 

 tory which it has chosen for its own 

 with an enduring clasp, and while its 

 blossoms make it a thing of beauty in 

 June and its evergreen leaves are not 

 ill to look upon in the winter, these 

 things do not compensate the farmer 

 for the tax which he pays on the land 

 upon which it thrives. It does not ap- 

 peal to him, but now it is wonderfully 

 attractive to the residents in the cities 

 and larger towns. They forget that 

 the blossoms are not especially beauti- 

 ful when plucked from the shrubs on 

 which they grew or if removed from 

 their habitat. Still there will be a 

 supply for those who pluck the blos- 

 soms for many years to come. — Hart- 

 ford Coitrant. 



Clipped from the columns of the 

 Boston Transcript of Saturday, June 

 ,21st, the above is worthy of thought- 

 ful perusal. Damning with faint 

 praise is no new art and it has lost 

 nothing in the hands of the scribe who 

 indited this note in the Hartford 

 ("'•iinint. If the note is intended to 

 increase its readers' appreciation of 

 the mountain laurel it is of a truth 

 curiously phrased. A stranger within 

 the gates might infer from it that the 

 farmers in Connecticut were so poor 

 that the very taxes on the bit of land 

 on which grows the mountain laurel 

 were driving them into bankruptcy. 

 True, the state is a small one, but 

 surely it is not so ground hungry that 

 it cannot spare the land on which 

 grows its own accepted state flower! 



The newspapers are the greatest 

 force in moulding thought and opinion 

 and in educating the people. This 

 everlastingly appraising everything in 

 dollars and cents is the curse of the 

 age. Here is a representative news- 

 paper of one of the (for its size) rich- 

 est states in the union actually writ- 

 ing as if it begrudged a little of its 

 countryside to its most beautiful na- 

 tive shrub because its wood "fails to 

 grow to a size which makes it 

 of value." The newspaper admits with 

 evident reluctance that "its blossoms 

 make it a thing of beauty in June and 

 its evergreen leaves are not ill to look 

 upon in the winter (but) these things 

 do not compensate the farmer for the 

 tax which he pays on the land upon 

 which it thrives." Pshaw! Such 

 puerile talk is unworthy of a people 

 acclaimed the richest on earth. A 

 cynic whilst admitting the material 

 wealth might retort that in apprecia- 

 tion of the beautiful the people are 

 among the poorest on earth. Happily 

 this article from the Hartford Courant 

 does not correctly reflect the true 

 opinion of the people of Connecticut; 

 otherwise the mountain laurel would 

 not have been the elected state flower. 

 What is required, however, on the 

 newspaper's own showing, is the en- 

 forcement of the law against the in- 

 discriminate plucking of laurel 

 branches. If this is not done the gen- 

 erations of Connecticut people which 

 come afterward will have to visit the 

 museums where dried specimens of 

 plants are preserved if they wish to 

 get an idea of what their state flower 

 was like. 



COMING MEETINGS. 

 Austin, Tex. — Texas State Florists' 

 Ass'n, meeting and trade exhibition, 

 July 9 and 10. Louis J. Tackett, Sec'y, 



Austin, Texas. 



Toronto, Can. — Canadian Horticul- 

 tural Association convention Aug. 12, 

 13. 14 and 15. 



Detroit, Mich.— S. A. F. and O. H. Con- 

 vention at Acadia Hall, Aug. 19, 20 

 and 21. Secretary, John Young, 1170 

 Broadway, N. Y. City. 



Hartford, Conn. — Conn. Hort. Society, 

 fall flower show, Sept. 9, 10 and 11. 

 Sec'y Alfred Dixon, Wethersfield, 

 Conn. 



New York City. — The American Insti- 

 tute and the American Dahlia So- 

 ciety, exhibition of dahlias in the 

 Engineering Building, 25-33 West 

 39th St., Sept. 23 to 25. William A. 

 Eagleson, 322-324 West 23d St., Sec- 

 retary. 



