18 



THE 1RRICATION AGE. 



fornia with the so-called olive oil largely 

 imported from Italy and other European 

 countries. Biit this latter stuff is. gener- 

 . ally speaking, not olive oil, but a mixture 

 of an insignificant amount of olive oil with 

 a large amount of peanut oil, cottonseed 

 oil, lard oil. mules fat or what not. There 

 is no possible comparison between the two. 

 any more than between the pure clarets of 

 California and the decoctions of logwood 

 and cheap alcohol sold to our unsuspect- 

 ing friend in the far Eastern States as 

 '! Choice French Claret." And in this 

 connection it would be well for those seek- 

 ing pure foods to note the fact that in our 

 own country hog fat does not grow upon 

 the olive tree nor logwood upon the grape 

 vine. 



NOTES. 



A few tobacco growers who are inter- 

 ested in finding out whether or not Ha- 

 vana leaf such as raised in Cuba can be 

 produced in the United States, have 

 formed an organization knoAvn as the "Cu- 

 ban Tobacco Growers' Company" and for 

 the past eighteen months have been mak- 

 ing experiments. Forty acres of land 

 was selected at Fort Meade, Fla., and a 

 a system of irrigation used, by which pip- 

 ing was laid underground, and provided 

 every 125 feet with a spray head. A 

 large Dean pump, with a capacity of 20,- 

 000 gallons per minute furnished the 

 water. The yield of tobacco was 35,000 

 pounds for the forty acres, and although 

 until it is cured it cannot be claimed that 

 the plant is a perfect substitute for the 

 Havana leaf, the growers have certainly 

 proved what irrigation will do, as without 

 its use such a large yield would have been 

 impossible. 



Frederick G. Coville, botanist of the 

 depaitment of agriculture, has made quite 

 a study of so-called "weeds'' and has dis- 

 covered that many of them are fit food for 

 man. The long-despised "pig-weed" or 

 "goose-foot," he claims belongs to the 

 same family as the beet and spinach and 

 with them is entitled to a place on our 



table. AVild mustard or charlock, which 

 is considered poisonous, is said to have 

 been used as a pot-herb in northern Eur- 

 ope many years ago. Of course the cow- 

 slip and dandelion are well-known as edi- 

 bles, but we have never thought of the 

 leaves of the chickory and dock in that 

 light. Pokeweed is used in some parts of 

 the south, and the department thinks that 

 in time milk weed, common nettle and 

 round mallow will be regarded a good 

 food. 



John Brady, the recently appointed 

 governor of Alaska, was one of a number 

 of street arabs sent to Indiana thirty years 

 ago by a children's aid society of New York. 

 He is said to have been the most unpre- 

 possessing one of the lot, but had the good 

 fortune to be taken by a kind hearted 

 judge, who gave him every advantage. 



The Kansas farmer is raising something 

 this fall besides wheat and corn, and that 

 is mortgages. It is said that one enthusi- 

 astic farmer, in telling of the marvelous 

 growth in Kansas, pointed to a hill saying : 

 "Talk about growing. See that hill? 

 Well, when I kim here that hill Was a 

 hole in the ground. " 



People who have long regarded the red 

 ant as a pest to be gotten rid of will be 

 surprised to hear that they are the fruit 

 growers best friend. An Arkansas fruit 

 grower who talked of shipping red ants to 

 that state was the first to bring the mat- 

 ter up, and since then the horticulturists 

 have been investigating the matter. It is 

 claimed that the ants destroy the worms 

 among the trees and that the woolly aphis, 

 an apple tree pest, is a chief article of 

 diet with them. It is said that the or- 

 chards in the vicinity of Delta, Colo. , are 

 full of red ants and that this accounts 

 for the fact of the trees being in such 

 good condition and free from worms. One 

 prominent fruit grower goes so far as to 

 say that the fruit crop in the state of Col- 

 orado would be a failure if the red ants 

 were all destroyed. 



According to some of the western pa- 



