WHY BOME PBUITS ARK IMPROVED 4."i1 



century and more, the native nuts nave attracted the 

 attention of economic writers. Their merits for food 

 have been praised without stint for years. Two excel- 

 lent books have been written abont them. Yet they 

 have made very littl>- progress towards amelioration. 

 The simple reason is that we have n<>t been pr< 

 by any necessity t<> grow them. No nut- are Btaple 



artidt-s of 1 1 among the peoples who have chiefly 



settled the United States, They are essentially sub- 

 sidiary and incidental features in our liv< - 

 while we all like hickory nnts and walnuts and the 

 like, we are nevertheless not impelled by any over- 

 ring necessity to gather the trees into the garden 

 or the orchard. We associate them more with the 

 woods and the landscape and the outings, than we <1<> 

 with the kitchen and the larder. They have no con- 

 spicuous places in our heritage of customs and 

 ciations, as the apples and grapes and berries have. 



Much tin- same observation can 1"- made res] 

 the native huckleberries, fruits which have been 

 recommended time and again as proper Bubjects for 

 amelioration, and yet practically nothing has been 

 done towards their improvement. The chief reason 

 of this neglect is, it Beems t<. in.-, that the imperative 

 needs which the huckleberries may !"■ supposed to 

 satisfy, are already Bupplied in large measure by other 

 berry-like fruits. 



There are apparent exceptions t«> all this in the 

 cranberry ami blackberry, for neither of these fruits 

 had ever been an important food for the human race. 

 Vet the very al mi iK la iic- of these fruits, and their 

 adaptability to the common needs of lite, forced them 



upon the attention of the settlers ami colonists, who 



