A REVIEW. gi 



tion of Nurserymen, pronounced to be the most beautiful 

 they ever saw. Such being the general good results of non- 

 cultivation, before inviting attention to some of the evil 

 effects of cultivation, no matter how shallow, which neces- 

 sarily destroys the surface-roots of trees, let us consider for 

 a few moments some of the peculiarities of those fine, hair- 

 like little feeding-roots that trees of all kinds, fruit and for- 

 est, instinctively push to the top of the ground, taking com- 

 plete possession if allowed, but of which neither fruit-growers 

 nor horticultural writers take the slightest notice. Cut and 

 slash them with the plow, cultivator or hoe as we may, back 

 again they come, if given only a few weeks' chance, to the 

 surface, Nature's kitchen, where she kindly spreads, cooked 

 by the action of the elements, her choicest food for the mil- 

 lions of hungry little mouths so eager to partake of it. Alas ! 

 the well-meaning but mistaken fruit-grower, under the delu- 

 sion that he is thus benefiting his trees, comes along at 

 short intervals with his infernal machines of tree torture, 

 tears the whole surface to pieces, scattering the soluble food 

 for the next flooding rain to carry away to the greedy rivers 

 and sea, while the patient, long-suffering trees at once go to 

 work to replace the poor little innocents that man has so 

 ruthlessly destroyed. 



And here let me quote an extract from the Houston 

 Chronicle of today, February 8, which so well expresses my 

 own belief for years : " Dr. Henry C. Conrad, of the Botani- 

 cal Division of Johns Hopkins University, after continued 

 experiments, is convinced that in some form or other plants 

 and trees have all the senses of animals except hearing. ' We 

 have never been able,' said Dr. Conrad, 'to discover any 

 way in which they are susceptible to sound, but in seeing, 

 feeling and tasting they are certainly developed. The Sun- 

 dew, a plant which grows in the swamps about Baltimore, 

 probably knows the sense of taste to a greater extent than 

 any other. With a single exception,' said Dr. Conrad, 

 'they can recognize light and the direction from which it 

 comes ; they feel the slightest wound, they discriminate in 

 taste, they have a sense of direction, whether they are 



