4O Success with Small Fruits. 



variation and improvement in which it formed so marked a contrast to 

 the Wood strawberry was discovered, it began to receive the attention it 

 deserved. English gardeners learned the* fact, of which we are making so 

 much to-day, that by simply sowing its seeds, new and possibly better 

 varieties could be produced. From that time and forward, the tendency 

 has increased to originate, name and send out innumerable seedlings, the 

 majority of which soon pass into oblivion, while a few survive and become 

 popular, usually in proportion to their merit. 



The Fragaria Virginiana, therefore, the common wild strawberry that 

 is found in all parts of North America east of the Rocky Mountains, is the 

 parent of nine-tenths of the varieties grown in our gardens; and its 

 improved descendants furnish nearly all of the strawberries of our markets. 

 As we have seen, the Fragaria Vesca, or the Alpine species of Europe, is 

 substantially the same to-day as it was a thousand years ago. But the 

 capacity of the Virginian strawberry for change and improvement is shown 

 by those great landmarks in the American culture of this fruit the pro- 

 duction of Hovey's Seedling by C. M. Hovey, of Cambridge, Mass., forty- 

 five years since ; of the Wilson's Albany Seedling, originated by John Wil- 

 son, of Albany, N. Y., about twenty-five years ago, and, in our own time, 

 of the superb varieties, Monarch of the West, Seth Boyden, Charles 

 Downing, and Sharpless. 



As in the Alpine species there are two distinct strains, the Alpine of 

 the Continent, and the Wood strawberry of England, so in the wild Vir- 

 ginian species there are two branches of the family, the Eastern and 

 the Western. The differences are so marked that some writers have 

 asserted that there are two species ; but we have the authority of Prof. 

 Gray for saying that the Western, or Fragaria Illincensis, is "perhaps" a 

 distinct species, and he classifies it as only a very marked variety. 



There are but two more species of the strawberry genus. Of the first 

 of these, the Fragaria Indica, or Indian strawberry, there is little to say. 

 It is a native of Northern India, and differs so much from the other species 

 that it was formerly named as a distinct genus. It has yellow flowers, and 

 is a showy house-plant, especially for window-baskets, but the fruit is dry 

 and tasteless. It is said by Prof. Gray to have escaped cultivation and 

 become wild in some localities of this country. 



Fragaria Chilensis is the last great species or subdivision that we now 

 have to consider. Like the F. Virginiana, it is a native of the American 

 continent, and yet we have learned to associate it almost wholly with 

 Europe. It grows wild on the Pacific slope, from Oregon to Chili, creep- 

 ing higher and higher up the mountains as its habitat approaches the 



