JANUARY. 23 



vessels, and only employing these to change the variety. So 

 there are some seed-producing varieties, which either from 

 local circumstances, or from inherent physiological properties, 

 are very unlikely to become mixed : and for years we may 

 continue to plant, generation after generation, without per- 

 ceiving any essential modification. But others, like corn, 

 melons, and the cucurbitaceous plants, generally, cannot be 

 kept either pure, or of equal value with the original seed, 

 without great diligence ; and the consequence is, that we 

 hear a good deal about the decay of old varieties, which, like 

 the Massachusetts Indians, have intermarried with other races 

 till the aboriginal distinction is nearly lost. 



It is familiar to all that the pure Autumnal Marrow squash, 

 (botanically,) can scarcely be purchased in the market, though 

 squashes are every year honestly raised and sold as such. The 

 buyers complain of the deterioration in quality, and the vend- 

 ers say that the kind is " running out."' The truth simply is, 

 that other kinds are " running in," and that the seed has not 

 been kept pure, and its very desirable qualities have been too 

 freely exchanged for properties of other squashes. The same 

 is true of the Prince Albert pea — a variety which once chal- 

 lenged competition in earliness, but which, as now raised, 

 seems to have lost this property in a great degree. But we 

 know a person who has so kept this pea by always saving the 

 seed from his first planting, which, blossoming before any 

 other pea, is never mixed, that he finds it as early, to say the 

 least, as any in the market now. The Lima bean is already 

 getting an unwonted earliness, (we call it acclimation j and 

 the Massachusetts Horticultural Society puts a bounty upon 

 this property, which may be a substitute for an original one,) 

 and, to our taste, losing its first quality, as it increases in 

 weight and thickness. We think we see a reason for this in 

 the presence of the Horticultural, and other large beans, in 

 gardens. These, — and many more illustrations might be 

 added, — will be sufiicient to show that to keep even those 

 varieties, which do not hybridize very readily, and are nec- 

 essarily grown from seed, we must look after seed-culture a 

 little more carefully. 



