182 APPENDIX. 



we may be with manures, or how copiously we supply 

 moisture, this cultivation cannot be dispensed with, if 

 we aim at producing fine fruits, and abundance of 

 them. ''But," says one cultivator, " by allowing the 

 ground to be all occupied with plants, we save all the 

 labor which would be consumed in removing the run- 

 ners, and we avoid the necessity of applying a mulch- 

 ing to keep the fruit clean." Very true, you save some 

 expense ; but what do you get in return ? A crop of 

 fruit not fit for the table — small, insipid, and so dirty, 

 if a heavy rain occurs about ripening-time, that it must 

 be put through the wash-tub before it is placed on the 

 table. It is possible that the market-grower may be 

 able to |)roduce berries of this kind at a less price per 

 quart than he could by a careful, cleanly, and thorough 

 system of culture ; but then he can expect to sell such 

 fruit only when no better can be had. "We have some 

 doubts, however, as to the economy of bad culture in 

 the long run. If a proper system v\'ere adopted at the 

 outstart, and followed up with regularity, it would not 

 be found so profitless or -expensive. In this, as in 

 every other kind of culture, a system is absolutely 

 necessary. A certain routine of operations which are 

 easily executed if taken at the right time, become bur- 

 densome when deferred ; and being so, they are not 

 unfrequently put off altogether. Precisely thus it is 

 that strawberry beds are neglected, both in market 



