PACKAGES, TRAINING, POLLINATION 99 



the same space of ground she raised five times the quan- 

 tity of fruit as her neighbors, much larger in size and 

 commanding a higher price. In the spring she thinned 

 her beds and threw plants in the street. Her neighbors, 

 hoping to duplicate her excellent results, picked them up 

 and planted them, but not a single fruit would they pro- 

 duce, for she had thrown out her staminate only." 



A chance remark by one of the Abergust boys revealed 

 the secret. As related by J. A. Warder : ^ "The boy was 

 sauntering through Mr. Longworth's strawberry patch, 

 whittling. Said the boy : ' Mr. Longworth, I reckon you 

 won't have many berries; nearly all of your plants are 

 males.' Mr. Longworth replied : ' Won't I have a few ? ' 

 ' Yes, I reckon so ; you will have a few there, and there, 

 and there,' said he, pointing to different spots in the bed. 

 Mr. Longworth had his wits about him and stuck stakes 

 where the boy said there would be fruit, and there the 

 fruit grew." This was the clue that led him to investi- 

 gate the subject. "I soon discovered," said Longworth, 

 "that there were what he called male and female plants, 

 and communicated this fact to our market gardeners," 

 who immediately took advantage of it. Ten years later 

 Cincinnati led the world in strawberry production; the 

 price dropped from thirty-seven cents to less than ten 

 cents a quart, and Abergust ceased to cultivate them. 

 It was shown that he had practiced mixed planting for 

 many years and had discovered its advantages independ- 

 ently. Being a plain, unlettered man, it was not likely 

 that he had ever heard of the work of Duchesne or Keens. 



The " strawberry war.'' — Longworth called attention 

 to his discovery in the Magazine of Horticulture for 

 1834, but it aroused little interest outside of Cincinnati. 

 1 Rept. lU. State Agr. Soc, III (1858-9), p. 384. 



