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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



been exasperatingly annoyed by some town boys 

 turned on them unexpectedly one day with a look so 

 pleasant that they were quite taken aback. Then he 

 spoke to them pleasantly. And then they stopped 

 bothering him. Commenting on his own experience 

 he said that " Returning good for evil is a great 

 unexplored region." Yet most of us have opportu- 

 nities for starting on an exploring expedition in that 

 region almost any day. Suppose we investigate. 



While reading the above it occurs to me 

 that some of the meanest men I evei" came 



across have been redeemed and transformel 

 by showing them kindness, and that you 

 have not only forgiven but forgotten some 

 past unpleasantness. I have seen such men 

 made over. But right now, while I dictate, 

 my conscience troubles me for using the 

 term mean man. They used to be what the 

 world calls " mean " and hard to get along 

 with, but they have been transformed by the 

 Christlike spirit. 



High-pressure Gardening 



HYBRIDS — THEIR SUPERIORITY THROUGHOUT 

 BOTH THE ANIMAL AND VEGETABLE KING- 

 DOMS^ MANY TIMES^ TO EITHER PARENT; 

 SOMETHING ABOUT TOMATOES. 



I have frequently mentioned my chickens 

 in Florida that are a cross between the 

 Buttercups and the White Leghorns. I 

 made this cross, for one thing, to see if I 

 could secure in this way more pullets than 

 roosters. I also expected to get a. better 

 strain of layers and hardier chickens; and 

 I tlunk I have succeeded at least pretty 

 well. Now, a very good friend of mine, 

 Mr. K C. Green, formerly of the Ohio Ex- 

 periment Station, has made it his business 

 for many years not only to test dii^'erent 

 varieties of tomatoes but to test crosses 

 made from these varieties; and he has giv- 

 en the vegetable world, through the agency 

 of our good friend W. Atlee Burpee, sever- 

 al of the verj' best tomatoes now gxown. 

 Well, last April, almost as soon as I arriv- 

 ed at Medina I Avent to our greenhouse and 

 got six potted tomato-plants. Mrs. Root 

 said that six would be ample for our small 

 family. About two weeks after, I met our 

 friend Green and he told me he would like 

 to have me try a few plants of the new hy- 

 brids which he has been getting out. He 

 brought me six, not potted, but just taken 

 from the seed-bed. So we have twelve 

 plants instead of six for our family. You 

 may remember we had some severe frosts 

 along the middle of May, and it was rather 

 tough on the tomato-plants. It would have 

 killed them all. no doubt, had T not covered 

 them with pails and some boxes. T knew 

 wooden pails would be better than metal; 

 but not having enough to go around, I used 

 one tin pail over one of the hybrid plants. 

 The frost froze it down to the ground. The 

 rest came out all right. But this one plant 

 put out a sprout down close to the gi'ound. 

 and quickly caught up, or nearly caught up, 

 Avith the rest. After the frost we had a week 

 or two of cold Avinds and bad wet weather. 

 The tomatoes all looked so sick that I 

 did not expect much of them, but I began 



to notice right away that the new hybrids 

 seemed to be hardier than the pot-gTown 

 plants from the greenhouse. Well, these 

 hybrids, although put out in the open 

 ground two weeks later, bore the first ripe 

 fruit. A little later Mrs. Root asked me if 

 there were not some more tomatoes, and I 

 told her I hardly thought there were. But 

 I went out with a tin pan, got it full, and 

 pulled off my cap and got that heaping full 

 of great smooth purple beauties. I was 

 surprised to find some of the handsomest 

 had riiDened up and commenced to crack 

 open when they had been under foliage 

 clear out of sight. This proved, as you 

 may readily believe, one of my " happy 

 surjirises." I hastened down to my friend 

 Green, and found he had pretty nearly half 

 an acre of just such plants. Said I, "Friend 

 Green, you are going to save a lot of seed 

 from these nice tomatoes, of course ? " 



" Why, Mr. Root, I can not do it. These 

 plants and the ones you have are the result 

 of hand-pollination. In order to get this 

 strain of tomatoes I was obliged to take the 

 pollen from the Earliana and cross it 

 with the pollen on the blossom of a Potato- 

 leaf tomato, or sometliing similar to the 

 Potato-leaf. Now, this first cross, as you 

 have noticed, is certainly superior to either 

 parent; but if I save seed from these hy- 

 brids I shall have a mixed-up mess and 

 notlung like the parent. This matter is 

 pretty well recognized at our experiment 

 stations, and is fully discussed in a bulletin 

 I will lend you. The title is ' Bulletin No. 

 .■■>46 of the Experiment Station, Oneida, N. 

 Y. Influence of Crossing in Increasing the 

 Yield of Tomatoes.' Now you see that all 

 of us Avho are gTowing tomato seed are up 

 against an obstacle. This precious seed is 

 obtained onlj^ by what is called hand-pol- 

 lination." 



]\Ir. Green here took his knife and show- 

 ed just how he did it. He got some pollen 

 on the point of the blade from one variety, 

 and carried it directly to the blossom of 

 another, and the fruit has to be watched 



