HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 247 



Dnimmondis, the nasturtiums, the four o' clocks, and the Schiz- 

 authus Centranthus, Vicaria, Autirrherium, bartonia, pyre- 

 thrum, Verbenas and all the pinks. Pansies drooped, asters quit, 

 Zinnias, candytufts, marygolds and many others of unknown 

 names, from papers of mixed seeds, withered badly. We tried 

 to get the scarlet lobelia, but received the blue instead, as we 

 did several other uncertain sorts of flowers from the same seeds- 

 man who partly wasted a summer's work for us in the vegetable 

 garden. The blue home proved to be a good little rustler and 

 bloomed in a nice border at our feet by the arbor all summer. 

 ■Gladiolus made moderate blooms. 



THE ORCHARD. 



There is nothing to say under this head except that every- 

 thing did so • well since the trying year when they were first 

 planted, I can not tell yet what varieties are hardiest. All the;^ 

 weak trees were cut back the second spring, and most of them 

 made new stems and have since done well. All are too young 

 to have the blight. I was greatly encouraged last spring, after 

 we had such long continued and severe cold weather, and 

 scarcely any protection from snow in my wind-swept orchard, 

 to find no traces of winter-killing whatever. The Leinherting 

 and Bessemianka pears, the Maldaoski and Arab plums, the Os- 

 theim and Riga cherries, came out as fresh and t^igorous as the 

 wild brush. 



. WILD PLUMS. 



]^o fruit last year — first failure since the country was settled, 

 so say the old settlers. I find so much variation in the fruit, 

 due to intermixing of pollen, and some other causes perhaps 

 not so well understood, that to protect myself from being adver- 

 tised as a fraud by people who " know not Joseph," or the nature 

 of the wild plum, I am declining all applications for cions, except 

 from the ofl&cial experimental stations, but shall save the pits of 

 my best fruit the next time I have a crop, and send there instead. 

 People will then know they have to take their chances. But I 

 am cutting down all groves of inferior sorts. 



THE SAND CHERRY. 



I find this germinates readily from spring planting of the pits. 

 We have an increasing number of reports of its behavior under 



