138 THE NEW HORTICULTURE. 



flow. But it seems that any such tenderness was far more 

 than compensated for by the abundant supply of food given 

 them, just where the greedy little surface roots could best 

 appropriate it, thus enabling the trees to resist the action of 

 the freeze and retain their fruit. Could there be a stronger 

 demonstration of the necessity for letting those roots alone ? 

 Of course we are not "out of the woods," for, while the 

 little peaches have shed their blooms and look all right, 

 some bad effect of such a freeze may yet show up, though I 

 don't believe it. If, however, these four trees mature their 

 crops, is not the problem of damage to this grand peach 

 from late frosts, to which it is more subject than any other 

 variety, entirely solved ? Certainly, at least with sod treat- 

 ment, and if so every peach-growing community in Texas 

 should send a representative to Lampasas in July to see this 

 object-lesson which will be worth so much to Texas and the 

 South. I will give the result in Farm and Ranch when all 

 danger of dropping is over. 



But those forty Elbertas are only a part of about 600 

 other peach and plum trees of many kinds, nearly all of 

 which are loaded. Another sod orchard on the other side of 

 the town, of about 400 trees, seems, to be in just as good 

 condition, while all the sod seedlings and transplanted trees 

 around town, except Elberta, are actually overloaded. 

 There are but two large, thoroughly cultivated orchards near 

 Lampasas, with the owner of one of which I talked yester- 

 day, who told me his whole crop was gone. The owner of 

 the other told a friend of mine that he "would not have a 

 peach unless some of the stray blossoms now appearing set." 



Now, as to the relative hardiness of varieties under 

 such a freeze. Of the improved kinds, Arp Beauty, Annie 

 Williams and Alexander are too full, while Chilow, Stump, 

 Wheeler, Dewey, Carman, Sneed and Rivers have good 

 crops; Triumph, Victor, Crosby, Frances, Dulce, Pond's 

 Late, Tarbell, Rogers and Mamie Ross, from a few peaches 

 to none at all. Of native seedlings, standing in various 

 yards around in Bermuda sod, which I have named and all 

 of which are loaded, I will mention the Harris, large, snow- 



