246 SUCCESS WITH SMALL FRUITS. 



fully. I do not know of any reason why our fine varieties 

 will not thrive abroad, under conditions that accord with 

 their nature. 



In America there are innumerable varieties, since Nature 

 produces wild seedlings on every hillside, and not a few 

 seeds have been planted by horticulturists in the hope of 

 originating a prize berry. Nature appears to have had the 

 better fortune, thus far, for our best varieties are chance 

 seedlings, found growing wild. 



It is not so many years since the blackberry was regarded 

 as merely a bramble in this country, as it now is abroad, 

 and people were content with such fruit as the woods and 

 fields furnished. Even still, in some localities, this supply 

 is so abundant as to make the culture of the blackberry un- 

 profitable. But, a number of years since, Mr. Lewis A. 

 Seacor led to better things, by obser\^ing on the roadside, 

 in the towni of New Rochelle, Westchester county. New 

 York, a bush flourishing where Nature had planted it. This 

 variety took kindly to civilization, and has done more to 

 introduce this fruit to the garden than all other kinds to- 

 gether. Mr. Donald G. Mitchell, in his breezy out-of-door 

 book, " My Farm at Edgewood," gives its characteristics 

 so admirably that I am tempted to quote him : — 



"The New Rochelle or Lawton Blackberry has been despite- 

 fully spoken of by many ; first, because the market fruit is gen- 

 erally bad, being plucked before it is fully ripened ; and next, 

 because, in rich, clayey grounds, the briers, unless severely cut 

 back, grow into a tangled, unapproachable forest, with all the 

 juices exhausted in wood. But upon a soil moderately rich, a 

 little gravelly and warm, protected from winds, served with oc- 

 casional top-dressings and good hoeings, the Lawton bears 

 magnificent burdens. Even then, if you wish to enjoy the rich- 

 ness of the fruit, you must not be hasty to pluck it. When the 

 children say, with a shout, ' The blackberries are ripe ! ' I 



