INTRODUCTION. 



It is only within a comparatively recent period that the 

 Small Fruits have been considered of sufficient importance 

 to command the attention and call forth the energies of 

 the skillful horticulturist. From all the information we 

 can gather from history, we infer that, with the single ex- 

 ception of the grape, very few of the small fruits common 

 at present, were cultivated or known in ancient times. 



Those that are mentioned in ancient history are named 

 only in connection with some wild legend of field or 

 forest, rendering it apparent that their cultivation and im- 

 provement were left for the people of a more progressive 

 age. The earlier English and French authors have very 

 little to say in regard to the berries, and so late as 1600 

 there appear to have been no improved varieties of the 

 currant or gooseberry, and both were supposed to be only 

 varieties of the same species. 



We have only to look back a very few years to ascer- 

 tain all that has been done in cultivating and improving 

 these fruits. In former times nature, without the assist- 

 ance of man, supplied most of the small fruits in quanti- 

 ties adequate to the demand, and of such a quality as to 

 satisfy uncultivated tastes. But of late years the increase 

 of population has been so rapid that the supply from the 

 woods and fields has not been equal to the requirements 



