30 



WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [1867. 



stands unrivalled for quality. The eaues, however, like those of all plants bear- 

 ing light-colored fruit, are unusually tender. Knevett's Giant, a superb variety 

 exhibited by Mr, 0. B. Hadwen during the past season, is highly praised in 

 the vicinity of Boston as also by our esteemed associate, Hon. Jona. Forbush of 

 Bolton. Of the absolute or even relative merits of the Philadelphia, which l^as 

 been so loudly vaunted and so widely dispersed, your Secretary does not feel, 

 after three years of patient experiment, that he can speak with decision. It was 

 originally advertised as perfectly hardy, having endured without injury a tempe- 

 rature of eighteen degrees below zero (18-0.) New canes in the immediate 

 vicinity of Oak street in the city of Worcester, that were purposely left exposed 

 throughout the winter of 1865-6, where they were not even protected by snow, 

 suffered no harm. But canes that were similarly exposed during the past 

 winter, although shielded by snow almost to their tips, were seriously injured. 

 The Society will doubtless share the surprise of the Secretary upon learning 

 from Dr. Joseph Draper, the accurate observer for the Smithsonian Institute 

 at the State Lunatic Hospital, that " the coldest day of the winter was the 

 19th of January, on which day the Thermometer stood at zero at 7 o'clock 

 A. M ; at 9 degrees above at 2 P. M ; and at 4 degrees above at 9. P. M. It 

 did not fall below zero at any time of observation during the winter." 



If the Philadelphia Raspberry cannot endure such a tempered severity of 

 climate, its popularity in this region will be of brief duration. 



" Alas! since I so soon was done for, 

 I wonder what I was begun for." 



It will be allowed one more trial to effectually test its hardiness, when, if it 

 fails it will cease to cumber the ground. 



A few Currants upon our tables afforded melancholy testimony to the capa- 

 city for destruction of the Insect-Pest which has recently attacked that 

 almost indispensable fruit. What shall be done to check, if not to prevent, the 

 ravages of the Currant Worm? It seems almost ludicrous to us, in Massachu- 

 setts, who consider from fifty to one hundred large bushes none too many for 

 the adequate supply of a family, as we listen to Pomologists in New York 

 urging the application of costly and scarce drugs. Even were powdered 

 White Hellebore more accessible and cheaper than it is, how would its use be 

 possible for a whole summer ? And yet from the first of June, when the 

 earliest perforations in the young leaves were observed, until the last atom of 

 foliage was devoured, did these ravenous Insects continue their career of devas- 

 tation. The process of generation goes on without intermission. When you 

 flatter yourself that, by a laborious and painful process of picking off the 

 worms by hand, they are all destroyed, a slight inspection of the foliage, as yet 

 intact, will disclose the results of that untiring industry by which the female 

 fly has essayed to make the "last state of that :nan worse than his first." 

 Stripping'the leaves simply anticipates the work of the worm. Efforts to crush 

 the eggs upon the leaves, suffering the latter to remain upon the bushes, afford 



