148 THE HOME ACRE. 



boarding-house. There is no reason why free peo- 

 ple in the country should be slaves to convention- 

 alities, prejudices, and traditions. If white currants 

 are sweeter, more delicious and beautiful than the 

 red, why, so they are. Therefore let us plant them 

 abundantly. 



If there is to be a queen among the currants, 

 the White Grape is entitled to the crown. When 

 placed upon the table, the dish appears heaped 

 with translucent pearls. The sharp acid of the 

 red varieties is absent, and you feel that if you 

 could live upon them for a time, your blood would 

 grow pure, if not " blue." 



The bush producing this exquisite fruit is like 

 an uncouth-looking poet who gives beauty from an 

 inner life, but disappoints in externals. It is low- 

 branching and unshapely, and must be forced in- 

 to good form the bush, not the poet by the 

 pruning-knife. If this is done judiciously, no 

 other variety will bear more profusely or present a 

 fairer object on a July day. 



The White Dutch has the well-known character- 

 istics in growth of the common Red Dutch currant, 

 and is inferior only to the White Grape in size. 

 The fruit is equally transparent, beautiful, mild, 

 and agreeable in flavor, while the bush is enor- 

 mously productive, and shapely in form, if properly 

 trained and fertilized. 



