AMERICAN HOME GARDEN. 343 



are as easily raised as willows, from layers, or cuttings planted 

 in the fall or early spring. There are many sub- varieties, with 

 considerable differences in the quality and pleasantness of their 

 acid, and it is worthy of care that your young plants be raised 

 from such as are most agreeable to your taste. 



The season of this fruit may be prolonged by planting some 

 in warm spots, or light soil, and others in the shade, or on a 

 north slope, or in cold soil, or by covering single bushes with 

 mats closely wrapped and fastened around them before they 

 are quite half ripe, uncovering them to the sun a few days be- 

 fore they are to be gathered for use, to sweeten them, as cur- 

 rants ripened in the shade are somewhat acid, though by no 

 means so sour as when left to become over-ripened upon leafless 

 branches in the sun. 



The Black Naples currant makes a conserve or jelly that is 

 very useful in domestic practice for removing soreness of the 

 throat, for preparing a cooling drink in fever by stirring it into 

 water, or for the easy administration of medicines to children. 

 The red and white, either separately or mixed, stripped and 

 sugared, are an ornament and a delicacy upon the tea-table ; 

 and the perfectly free use of the ripe, fresh-gathered fruit in 

 this form, or directly from the bushes, is, in general, a com- 

 plete preventive of summer complaint and tendency to dysen- 

 tery in children or adults. 



THE FIG. 



Wherever the climate favors their production, figs are among 

 the most easily cultivated of fruits, the natural growth of the 

 tree being such as to render pruning almost entirely unnec- 

 essary, and one or two crops a year being yielded with cer- 

 tainty. In latitudes north of 40 they require protection, but 

 in warm situations, in cities, against a wall, or in a recess by 

 a house or other building, or even in some open situations, a 

 pretty thick coating with straw and matting, or laying down 

 the whole tree and banking earth over it, will be found to 

 answer this purpose, and one small crop per year can be ob- 

 tained. 



The ripe, undried fruit, however, is very luscious, with a 



