392 Bush-Fruits 



on the lawn for ornament, a good market had been found 

 for the fruit. 



Doubtless the barberry would make good jelly, but 

 so do the apple and the currant, which are more easily 

 prepared. The Japanese quince has even more claim to 

 merit as a fruit bearing ornamental than have the vibur- 

 num and the barberry. 



Barberries may be propagated by seeds, which should 

 be sown or stratified in the fall, or by separating the 

 suckers which spring up about the main stem. They may 

 also be grown from cuttings of one or two-year-old wood, 

 taken in the fall, or treated like currant and gooseberry 

 cuttings, though they do not root so readily as these plants. 



The merits of the barberry as an ornamental plant 

 need not be further discussed, but as a fruit-producing 

 plant it may teach a lesson. We talk much of the im- 

 provement of wild fruits, and are almost led to believe 

 that we can take anything that is edible, no matter how 

 small, hard, sour, puckery or thorny it may be, and by 

 careful selection and hybridizing, produce from it a fruit 

 which shall delight the taste and swell the purse of coming 

 generations. Does not the history of the barberry suggest 

 that, after all, there may be some things not worth im- 

 proving? 



THE SAND-CHERRY 



Although its relationships might more naturally classify 

 it among the stone-fruits, the western sand-cherry may 

 well be mentioned in the discussion of miscellaneous 

 bush-fruits. This plant is known botanically as Prunus 



