42 Success with Small Fruits. 



tion. Duchesne, in 1766, says that "Miller considered its cultivation 

 abandoned in England on account of. its sterility. The importations from 

 other portions of South America appear to have met with better success ; 

 and, early in the present century, new varieties of the F. Chilensis, as 

 well as of the Virginiana, became quite abundant in England and on the 

 Continent" 



If we may judge from the characteristics of the varieties imported to 

 this country of late years, the South American species has taken the lead 

 decidedly abroad, and has become the parent stock from which foreign cult- 

 urists, in the main, are seeking to develop the ideal strawberry. But in all 

 its transformations, and after all the attempts to infuse into it the sturdier 

 life of the Virginian strawberry, it still remembers its birthplace ; and 

 falters and often dies in the severe cold of our winters, or, what is still 

 worse, the heat and drouth of our summers. As a species, it requires the 

 high and careful culture that they are able and willing to give it in Europe. 

 The majority of imported varieties have failed in the United States, but a 

 few have become justly popular in regions where they can be grown. The 

 Triomphe de Gand may be given as an example, and were I restricted to 

 one variety I should take this. The Jucunda, also, is one of the most 

 superb berries in existence ; and can be grown with great profit in many 

 localities. 



Thus the two great species which .to-day are furnishing ninety-nine- 

 hundredths of the strawberries of commerce and of the garden, both in 

 this country and abroad, came from America, the Fragaria Chilensis 

 reaching our Eastern States by the way of Europe, and in the form of 

 the improved and cultivated varieties that have won a name abroad. 

 We are crossing the importations with our own native stock. President 

 Wilder's superb seedling, which has received his name, is an example of this 

 blending process. This berry is a child of the La Constante and Hovey's 

 Seedling, and, therefore, in this one beautiful and most delicious variety 

 we have united the characteristics of the two chief strawberry species 

 of the world, the F. Virginiana and F. Chilensis. 



It will be seen that the great law of race extends even to strawberry 

 plants. As in the most refined and cultivated peoples there is a strain of 

 the old native stock, which ever remains a source of weakness or strength, 

 and will surely show itself in certain emergencies, so the superb new 

 varieties of strawberries, the latest products of horticultural skill, speedily 

 indicate in the rough-and-tumble of ordinary culture whether they have 

 derived their life from the hardy F. Virginiana or the tender and fas- 

 tidious F. Chilensis. The Monarch of the West and the Jucunda are the 



