62 Editors' Letter- Box. 



Anonymous Inquiries. — We give notice once more, that, while we are 

 ready to answer any question accompanied with the name of the writer, we can- 

 not give information in reply to others. This notice will be an answer to several 

 of this character. 



H. C. Beardslee, Ohio. — Why is the " patience " of the English, the Rutnex 

 pafientia, so seldom seen in our gardens ? It is a hardy perennial, of easy cul- 

 ture, produces abundantly, and, as a pot-herb, is, to my taste, scarcely inferior to 

 spinach. A row twenty feet long supplies my table with "greens." — We were 

 not aware that "patience " could now be found cultivated in any garden in the 

 country. Indeed, we think the plant, as well as the manner in which it is used 

 as a table-esculent, very little known. It appears to have been introduced from 

 Europe prior to the beginning of the last century, and, though occasionally found 

 in the gardens of the early settlers, we believe it rarely received much attention, 

 and was generally left to fight its way as best it might. Few plants are more 

 hardy, or tenacious of life ; and we not unfrequently meet with it lingering in 

 the vicinity of old gardens where it had formerly been grown, springing up annu- 

 ally as a weed, and putting forth its ample leaves in the most profuse abundance. 

 For the table, however, we do not consider it equal to spinach ; still, as the cul- 

 ture is so simple, and the yield so abundant, it may be worthy more attention 

 than it has hitherto received. We are glad to learn that it is having a fair 

 trial, and hope to hear again from our correspondent respecting it. 



R. inquires, if dwarf pear-trees can be profitably grown in small, highly-cul- 

 tivated gardens, why they may not be in larger ones with the same care ? He does 

 not see why, if a half-acre can be cultivated at a given expense, a whole acre 

 cannot be at twice that expense, and ten acres at ten times the cost of one. — 

 Our correspondent's logic and arithmetic are both correct : his error lies in the 

 assumption that the same proportionate care will be bestowed upon ten acres as 

 upon one acre, which it will not, for various reasons, the chief of wliich is, that 

 in this country, at least, the skilled labor necessary can be obtained only at a 

 cost beyond what the return will justify, or else it cannot be obtained at all. In 

 all the most successful instances of growing pears on dwarfs, the greater part of 

 the labor has been done in small gardens by the owners themselves ; but the 

 limit of the work which any one man can do with his pair of hands is soon 

 reached. Moreover, the personal interest which the cultivator of a half-acre of 

 pet trees feels in them cannot be bought at any price. The maxim, which, in 

 various forms, has been repeated for two thousand years, that " the foot of the 

 husbandman is the best manure for the soil," is emphatically true in every 

 branch of horticulture, and in none more so than in this. Another reason for 

 the greater success of dwarf pears in small gardens is that they are generally 

 much more sheltered than in large orchards. 



S. F. DaC, Philadelphia. — Syringe the roses with whale-oil soap, or dust 

 them with white hellebore-powder. Either will kill slugs or thrips. As to rose- 

 bugs, pick them off, and put them in hot water. 



