A TREATISE ON NUT CULTURE. 27 



A BAG OF NUTS, WHENCE THEY COME. 



TIMELY TALK ON THE NUT-PRODUCING TREES IN MANY LANDS NUTTING 



PARTY IN ENGLAND A REVERIE OVER THE WALNUTS AND FILBERTS, 



BRAZIL NUTS AND PEANUTS CALLS UP SCENES OF MANY 



LANDS AND STRANGE PEOPLES. 



* * 



By Robert Blight. 



" I have a venturesome fairy that shall seek 

 The squirrel's hoard and fetch thee new nuts." 



MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM. 



tHIS is the season of nuts, for they are ripening fast. The hurry and bustle 

 of modern life have knocked all the nonsense out of romance, and one 

 rarely hears of a nutting party now. We buy our nuts in the streets, so many 

 " for five cents;" we do not gather them in "the merrie greenwood." As we 

 go down the street we doubtless have a greater choice than if we strolled 

 through the bosky dells, for here are Chestnuts and Walnuts (English and 

 Domestic), Filberts, Cob-nuts and Barcelonas; Brazil nuts and Cocoanuts. 



Give me, however, a good old-fashioned nutting party in the golden 

 October days, when the woodland defies the artist with the splendor of its 

 coloring. The merry laugh of the maiden and the youth, the gentle polite- 

 ness of the youth as he holds down the bough and the coy acceptance of the 

 maiden, as she picks the spoils; the affected fright as the fingers are impaled 

 on the chestnut's spiny casing and the more than half-in-earnest solicitude as 

 search is made for the thorn; the dainty way in which the walnut is picked up, 

 lest its bruised rind should stain the " lily-white hand" -all go to make up a 



