46 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Horace Walpole named his lovely country-seat "Strawberry Hill." This 

 plant is found wild and apparently native in both hemispheres, and has 

 since received such further development, there is hardly a climate or soil 

 to which some variety is not adapted. 



We always hope to show patriotic sentiments "Fourth of July," by eat- 

 ing new potatoes, our own native American tubers. Long may they wave 

 —their tops— in the gentle breezes, of course. Let Persia claim her beans 

 and cucumbers, but give me "Mayflower" potatoes, or give me something 

 better. The bean, however, has built up New England, and we all re- 

 member Daniel and his companions, excused from the king's wine and 

 meat, were permitted a diet of pulse and water, "and at the end of ten 

 days their countenances appeared fairer and fatter in flesh than all the 

 children which did eat the portion of the king's meat." "As cool as a 

 cucumber" was supposed to be nonsense, till an enterprising scientist 

 introduced his thermometer into one near its center of growth, and found 

 that point phenomenally cool. This plant has been used to assuage fevers, 

 and if consumers can wait, as we do, till cucumbers are fully grown, just 

 before turning yellow, no danger of cholera will ensue. That renowned 

 traveler, Madam Ida Pfeiffer, at one time, for three days, could get 

 nothing else to eat. 



Tomatoes are good alone or combined, raw, stewed, baked or in soups, 

 and their calomel makes them sspecially valuable for bilious persons. 

 To get the best results, plants must be set early, and box-like inclosures 

 or old peach baskets got ready for covering them frosty nights. My weary 

 pilgrimages up and down our long row as, 



"The shades of nignt were falling fast." 

 and again, 



"At break of day," 

 do indeed remind us of Longfellow's youth when 



"From his lips escaped a groan. Excelsior!" 



As for melons, having been robbed many years in succession, we long 

 ago gave up the unequal contest of raising them, till now I hardly know 

 in what month they come or any of their qualities. 



Autumn has a royal gift of apples, plums, grapes and nuts. It is said a 

 confirmed apple-eater never gets bilious, and the grape cure for consump- 

 tion is well known. Then, when our land is fast locked in ice and snow, 

 what satisfaction to 'contemplate canned fruit and jellies, crisp cabbages, 

 golden squashes and pumpkins, onions in their airy crates, and turnips 

 buried in sand or sawdust to prevent wilting. 



Whoever takes pains to set out and cultivate a garden, can, in addition 

 to his wholesome exercise, eat a complete course of medicine. Is not that 

 better than a complete course of drugs? Of flf ty-two centenarians ex- 

 amined by Prof. Humphry of Cambridge, nearly all were "small meat- 

 eaters." "What can I do for my little boy,"asked a mother, "sothat he wont 

 want to eat between meals?" "Have the meals thicker together?", replied 

 this young gourmand. Piecing between meals, candy, spices, irritants 

 and stimulants will tempt less where food is simple and nourishing, and 

 work be done not on one's nerve but by genuine strength. 



An Arabian legend says Satan, claiming the whole world, demanded, 

 one year, half their crops for rent. Given his choice, he selected, as we 

 might suppose, the top half. That year they planted turnips and carrots. 

 Satan in a rage reversed his choice, whereupon the wily Arabs planted 



