The Canadian Horticulturist. 



HORTICULTURAL HUMBUGS. 



"It really seems as if the creature, man, was as anxious to be deceived in seeds as in 

 quack medicines, for we do not hesitate to declare upon our reputation as seedsmen of re- 

 pute that nine-tenths of the so-called new sorts advertised at high prices are, so far as 

 merit goes, rank humbugs, and it is time the public were told so." — Landreth d- Sons [Phil- 

 adelphia) Catalogue for 1890, page 2 of cover. 



Soil mm 



-HI^^bS*BBHE above is a tremendous indictment and boldly and squarely 

 made ; made, too, by the oldest seed - house, we believe, 

 in America, it having been established 107 years, or in 1874, and 

 ^^^^^SSs ^^^'^ holding its place in the front rank. Made by such respect- 

 able people it is entitled to rather more than ordinary attention, 

 particularly when we hear it echoed by many respectable horticulturists and re- 

 echoed by the much-victimized public. 



Just now the catalogues come fluttering in like valentines on that good saint's 

 anniversary ; and, like them too, in every style, from the plain and practical to 

 the very gay and gaudy. Some, if not quite true to nature, are yet clever crea- 

 tions of art. 



Taking up one of these we find no less than twenty-two quarto pages devoted 

 to "Novelties and Specialties." Many other catalogues are about equally am- 

 bitious to show as much of this kind of "bunting" as any admiral on the sea of 

 horticultural adventure. Very few of this class are Canadian, it is comforting to 

 note ; and to know, further, that we can refer to, and rely upon, the plain and 

 unpretentious catalogues of our own people in this line of business, such as those 

 of Messrs. A. M. Smith, of St. Catharines, and Holton, of Hamilton, nursery- 

 men, and G. A. Bruce & Co., seedsmen, Hamilton. The writer mentions these 

 not by any means to disparage others, but from a long acquaintance of over a 

 third of a century and a knowledge of their reliability and success. They could 

 not have been thus reliable had their advertisements been of that class of Novel- 

 ties, "nine-tenths of which are rank humbugs," as charged by Messrs. Landreth 

 (Sc Sons. 



However, it is not with Novelties, or with the New, merely because it is new, 

 that we ought to quarrel, or can afford to quarrel, but with the abuses of the 

 name and with the iniquities the name Novelty is made to perpetrate. Progress 

 is a law of the human mind, and signifies in the word itself, not only the im- 

 provement of the old, but also some displacement of the old by the discovery 

 and invention of new and better in every line of human production. But that 

 word " better " again implies trial^a proving of all things, and the " holding fast 

 of that which is " not only "good," but that which is best both of new and old. 

 To be tried, the new must be introduced to the notice of those who are expected 

 to try. This, again, implies advertising and illustration. Here Demand, hungry 



