226 Strmohernj Report, read before Cincinnati Hort. Sac. 



culiarities of inflorescence, and watch the consequent effects upon the fruc- 

 tification. As an evidence of the fidelity with which your Committee have 

 discharged their duty, allow them to say, that this Report is based upon 

 more than two hundred and seventy recorded observations, which were 

 made with critical accuracy, and as extended, in almost every instance, as 

 it was possible to render them ; hence, it may be safely assumed, that they 

 have now sufficient data, and abounding testimony to prove the postulates 

 they intend to lay down in this report. The whole subject has been so ably 

 and so frequently explained to this Society and community, that there is 

 nothing now left for your Committee, who only reiterate truths well estab- 

 lished and generally admitted among us. 



The first observations were made on the fourth day of last May, at the 

 gardens of Messrs. A H. Ernst, S. S. Jackson, Wm. Heaver, and N. 

 Longworth, Esq., where were found most of the celebrated varieties so 

 highly vaunted in the Eastern states and in Europe. In these gardens, the 

 several kinds were cultivated with the greatest care, and kept as distinct as 

 possible from contamination one with another ; and as these cultivators have 

 spared no expense in obtaining their stocks from eastern establishments of 

 the highest note, you may rest assured that the several kinds are correctly 

 marked, as they were received, unavoidable accidents and the errors of 

 those who packed them, alone excepted. 



Extended and repeated observations were also made at later periods 

 throughout the season of fruiting, at these and other places, among which 

 the " Garden of Eden " must be mentioned as a spot where many varieties 

 are cultivated, and a great number of new seedlings are coming on; all 

 grown with great care— the kinds being kept apart — indeed, so great is the 

 tendency of this plant to spread itself by runners, that too much care can- 

 not be exercised to keep the kinds separate until the grower has made him- 

 self perfectly familiar with the distinctions of foliage, pubescence, habit, &c., 

 of each, and this will require close observation and a practised eye ; though 

 some varieties are sufficiently well marked in their characters. Thus, 

 Hovey's Seedling may be easily recognized by any one upon a very slight 

 acquaintance, and it is difficult for us to conceive how the Editor of the 

 Horticulturist, who is supposed to be a practical gardener and botanist, 

 could, by possibility, have thought he was cultivating the true Hovey's 

 Seedling (pistillale) which he informs us (pages 85 and 160, vol. 1.) were 

 covered with staminate flowers ; unless, indeed, the source from which his 

 bed was planted was impure, and contained some staminate plants which 

 had not been recognized. For the want of this kind of practical knowledge, 

 we would fain believe, rather than from any willingness to deceive their 

 purchasers, our eastern cultivators have sometimes sent us diflferent kinds 

 in the same parcel, and in different parcels with the same labels attached, as 

 has been observed by the committee in their recent investigations. 



The committee, after carefully collating and reviewing the 

 facts which they have observed, present tiine conclusions or 

 postulates deduced from their nnited observations, viz. : — 



