22 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XXI. No. 519 



tenable. Yet tbere has been a decided uplift in methods of sim- 

 ple tillage and preparation of land and the science of feitilizing 

 the soil; and, moreover, the application of this knowledge is 

 widespread where it was once local or rare. And the applica- 

 tion of machinery and mechanical devices to almost every horti- 

 cultural labor cannot have escaped the attention of the most 

 careless observer. 



Among specific horticultural industries, the recent evolution of 

 the glass-house has been remarkable. In 1806 the green-house 

 was still a place in which to keep plants green, and M'Mahon felt 

 obliged to disapprove of living rooms over it to keep the roof from 

 freezing, because they are "not only an additional and unneces- 

 sary e-vpense, but they give the building a heavy appearance." 

 The first American green-house, with a wooden roof and heavy 

 sides, was built in 1764. Glass-houses increased in numbers very 

 slowly until the middle of this century, and they can only now 

 be said to be popular. Twenty years ago a glass-house was a 

 luxury or an enterprise suited only to large concerns, and the 

 management of it was to most intelligent people an impenetrable 

 mystery. At the present time, even the humblest gardener, if he 

 is thrifty, can afford a green-house. In fact, the glass-house is 

 rapidly coming to be an indispensable adjunct to nearly all kinds 

 of progressive gardening. The secret of this increasing popularity 

 of the glass-house is the simplicity of construction of the modern 

 building. Large glass, low, straight roofs, light frames, simple 

 foundations, small wrought-iron pipes, portable automatic heaters 

 — these are the innovations which have given the green-house 

 a greater popularity and practicability in America than any- 

 where else Id the world. Yet many of these features would 

 have been heresies when Leuchars wrote his excellent bcok in 

 1850. 



The simplification and popularization of the glass-house has 

 simplified the management of i>lants in them. Even laymen are 

 now taking to green-house plant growing, and man}' of them 

 achieve most gratifying results. The first da> s of the commercial 

 forcing of plants are still within the memory of many of this 

 audience; and it is only within the present decade that great 

 attention has been given in this country to the forcing of toma- 

 toes, cucumbers, carnations, and many other plants. The business 

 is yet in its infancy. The green-house has also exerted a marked 

 influence upon the plants which are grown in them. There has 

 now appeared a list of varieties of various plants which are es- 

 pecially adapted to the purposes of forcing; and this phenomenon 

 is probably the most important and cogent known proof of con- 

 temporaneous evolution. 



If one were asked off-hand what is the most conspicuous recent 

 advancement in horticulture, he would undoubtedly cite the ad- 

 vent of the sprays for destroying insects and fungi. These are 

 not only eminently effective, but they were perfected at a time 

 when dismay had overtaken very many of our horticulturists, 

 and they have inspired new hope everywhere, and have stimu- 

 lated the planting of fruit and ornamentals. I fancy that the 

 future historian will find that the advent of the spray in the latter 

 part of this century marked an important epoch in agricultural 

 pursuits. Yet this epoch is not disconnected from the era before 

 it. It is but a natural outcome or consequence of the rapid in- 

 crease of insect and fungous enemies, which increase, in turn, is 

 induced by the many disturbing influences of cultivation itself. 

 When we devise effective means of checking the incursions of our 

 foes, therefore, we are only keeping pace with the initial progress 

 fostered by the origination of new varieties and the quickening 

 commercial life of our time. Yet the era of spraying is none the 

 less a mark of great achievement, and we have not yet seen the 

 good of which it will ultimately prove to be capable. But a 

 greater achievement than this must be made before we shall have 

 reached the ideal and inevitable method of combatting external 

 pests: we must learn to so control natural agencies that one will 

 counteract another. Nature keeps all her forces and agencies in 

 comparative equilibrium by pitting one against another in the re- 

 morseless struggle for existence. The introduction of insect 

 parasites and predaceans, entomogenous fungi, colonization of in- 

 sectivorous birds, and the use of strategy in cultivation and in 

 the selection of immune species and varieties and the planning of 



rotations and companionships of plants, vvill eventually be so 

 skilfully managed that most of our enemies will be kept under 

 measurable control. A short rotation is now known to be the best 

 means of combatting wire-worms and several other pests. Ihe 

 first great success in this direction in America is the introduction 

 of the Australian vedalia, or lady-bug, to devour the most pestif- 

 erous of the orange-tree scales on the Pacific coast. This experi- 

 ment is pregnant of greater and more abiding results than all the 

 achievements of the sprays. But in your generation and mine, 

 men must shoulder their squirt-guns as our ancestors shouldered 

 their muskets, and see only the promise of the time when they 

 shall be beaten into prunmg-hooks and plough shares and there 

 shall come the place of a silent warfare 1 



4. There is great progress in the metlwds of handling and j/reseninff 

 hortietiltiurd prodiicts. I need not tell the older men in this audi- 

 ence that there has been progress in the methods of handling 

 fruits. When they were boys, npples and even peaches were 

 taken to market loose in a wagon-box. We have all seen the de- 

 velopment of the special-package industry, beginning first with 

 rough bushel baskets or rude crates, then a better made and 

 smaller package which was to be returned to the consignor, and 

 finally the trim and tasty gift packages of the present day. I am 

 sorry to say that some regions have not yet reached this latter- 

 stage of development, but their failure to do so only makes the 

 contrast stronger ot those who have reached it. Quick transpor- 

 tation and methods of refrigeration have tied the ends of the earth 

 together. Apples in quantity are carried 14,000 miles from Tas- 

 mania to England, and in 1890 they reached the San Francisco 

 markets to compete with the fruits of the Pacific coast. From a 

 small beginning in 1845, the exportation of American apples to 

 England and Scotland began to assume commercial importance 

 from 1875 to 1880, until nearly a million and a half barrels have 

 been exported in a single season. It is said that the first bananas 

 were brought to the United States in 1804, and the first full cargo 

 in 1830. Now from eight to ten million bunches arrive annually. 

 The Canary Islands are now shipping tomatoes to London, and 

 the United States will soon be doing the same. Watermelons will 

 follow. California now unloads her green produce in the same 

 market. Even pears are exported from America to Belgium, dis- 

 puting the old saw that it is unwise to carry coals to Newcastle. 

 The world is our market. But this result may have been achieved 

 with some detriment to home markets and transportation, which 

 have been in seme measure overlooked and neglected; but this- 

 evil must correct itself in Ihe long run. 



Perhaps we owe to a Frenchman the first distinct exposition, 

 some eighty rears ago, of a process of preserving peiishable arti- 

 cles in hermetically sealed cans; but the process first g. lined 

 prominence in the United States, and it became known as canning. 

 In 1825, James Monroe sij^ned patents to Thomas Kenseit and 

 Ezra Daggett to cover an improvement in the art of preserving, 

 although Kensett appears to have practised his method somewhat 

 extensively as early as 1819. Isaac Winslow of Maine is supposed, 

 to have been the pioneer in canning sweec-corn, in 1843. About 

 1847 the canning industry began to attract general attention, and 

 in that year the tomato was first canned. The exodus to Cali- 

 fornia in 1849 stimulated the industry by creating a demand for 

 unperishable eatables in compact compass. North America now 

 leads the world in the extent, variety, and excellence of its canned 

 products, and much of the material is the product of orchards 

 and gardens. In 1391, the sweet-corn pack of the United States 

 and Canada was 2,799,453 24-can cases, and the tomato pack wa& 

 3.405,365 cases! Over 20,000 canning factories give employment,. 

 it is said, to about one million persons during the canning season.. 

 The rise of the evaporated fruit industry is not less remarkable in 

 its way than that of the canning industry. 



There are other marvels of progress in methods of caring for 

 horticultural products, but these examples sufficiently illustrate 

 my position. I am aware that all these things are features of 

 commerce and manufacture rather than of horticulture, but they 

 are responsible for much of the phenomenal extension of horti- 

 cultural interests in recent years. They have also exerted a 

 powerful influence upon the plants which we cultivate, and varie- 

 ties have appeared which are particularly adapted to long carriage 



