38 MASSiCHaSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIEXr. 



BLACKBERRIES. 



Three or four of our members have shown this fruit, in great perfection, 

 year after year. It is however doubtful if the culture of the blackberry is 

 extending from year to year among our market gardeners. While some have 

 •had excellent success with this crop, and made it a profitable one, others, from 

 having planted on a poor soil, or from having failed to take suitable care of 

 them, have not obtained such results as will lead them to extend, or even 

 continue, its cultivation. No fruit is more difficult to gather; no bushes so 

 difficult to train and prune. One must be prepared with a proper suit of 

 clothes, and with a glove, if he would venture among the bushes to perform 

 either task. Notwithstanding all these objections, we cannot well dispense 

 with this rich fruit. 



PLUMS. 



As with cherries, so with plums, they are no longer profitable. That great 

 enemy, the curculio, and the mysterious and very troublesome black wart, 

 have banished the plum tree from nearly all our gardens. Few specimens are 

 shown from year to year. We can, however, part with this fruit much better 

 than with many others, for it never was so healthful a fruit as many, and it 

 comes at a time when there is plenty of other fruit. If we can only have 

 plenty of peaches, pears and grapes, we can spare the plums without much 

 regret. 



PEACHES. 



Is our prediction, made and repeated for several years past, to be fulfilled? 

 Verily, it looks like it. Peaches! good ripe peaches, beautiful red-cheeked 

 Rareripes and Crawfords, were shown, we may almost say, in abundance, on 

 our tables the past season. It makes one's mouth water to think of the great 

 luscious peaches exhibited by Hervey Davis, J. T. Foster, F. Dana, and 

 others, both at the weekly and at the annual exhibition. 



We cannot fully say that we are entirely rid of the yellows, or that 

 we are to continue to have seasons favorable to the peach, but we may 

 hope for such things when we remember the good crops some of us 

 have had for two years past on our trees. That this feeling is enter- 

 tained by a good many others is shown in the fact that peach trees are 

 in great demand, at large prices, when compared with the prices of former 

 years. See, in memory's glass, that old homestead, with its ample peach 

 orchard of large and luxuriant trees, where, in our boyhood days, we used 

 to shake down from the well -filled branches the great red-cheeked, deli- 

 cious Rareripes and Melocotons ! — where every one was welcome to come 

 and eat " without money and without price." Shall we see such things again ? 

 Shall our children enjoy such privileges on our homesteads ? Let us continue 

 to plant peach trees, and hope for the best. We cannot overstock the market 

 with this fruit, if we try ; for such are the conveniences now-a-days for pre- 



