II^SECTS INJURIOUS TO THE CRANBERRY. 127 



half. The other half, where the sun did not reach, 

 were left sound. Good sound berries, picked and left 

 standing in the sun, in a box or barrel, on hot days will 

 soften upon the top. The sun's rays shining through a 

 window on berries stored in a building, will soften them 

 wherever the direct rays fall upon them at mid-day, or if 

 the thermometer reaches seventy-five in the shade at the 

 time, they will become soft. 



'' The evidence is positive that berries exposed to the 

 sun's rays, at the time the temperature is at eighty or 

 more in the shade, will be softened ; that is, if they are 

 picked. But if the vines are suffering from drouth, and 

 fail to supply the fruit hanging upon them with mois- 

 ture, is not the effect in cutting short the supply the 

 same as if we pick the berries ? It is evident that, at 

 high temperatures, the fruit evaporates water from its 

 skin, and this, carrying off caloric in a latent form, keeps 

 the internal structure cool, and so prevents the disor- 

 ganization of its parts. It is evident also, that moist 

 surfaces of ground must be cooler than dry ones, and 

 the berries growing upon them will be at a lower tem- 

 perature from the evaporation of its moisture. 



'^^Let us suppose a bog with frequent ditches, and the 

 water kept at a uniform depth from the surface in every 

 part, and a * Scald ' comes on ; the fruit on some parts 

 of it may be softened, and on others not. I have ex- 

 amined the sub-soil in places where the fruit was soft- 

 ened, and it was coarse gravel, for this or some other 

 reason, it was unable to raise the moisture to the sur- 

 face by capillary attraction, and had acquired a higher 

 temperature at the surface where the soft berries were 

 than elsewhere. 



" I have seen the berries soften on surfaces black with 

 shallow layers of muck, while a few feet from them, on a 

 surface of white sand, berries escaped, the sub-soil being 

 the same in both places. A thermometer placed among 



