144 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 213. 



display of Cacti as can be seen nowhere else in this coun- 

 try, and a feature of great interest will be a contest for the pre- 

 mium offered for Mushrooms. 



The last bulletin from the South Dakota Agricultural Col- 

 lege Station relates to the growing of the Sugar Beet, and it is 

 stated that with proper cultivation these Beets, with a high per- 

 centage of sugar, a good purity co-efficient, a large yield per 

 acre, and in every way adapted for the manufacture of sugar, 

 can be grown throughout the greater portion of that state. A 

 report from the Experiment Station of Wyoming also adds that 

 the dry cool autumn of the arid region there tends to store 

 sugar in the beets, which will grow well where a slight summer 

 irrigation can be given to the crop in a mellow soil. 



A new Violet, burdened with the name of Frau Hof Garfen- 

 direktor Jiilke, and said to be a cross betwen Lee's Queen Vic- 

 toria Violet and V. Rossica superba, was introduced a year 

 ago by a German florist. The Gardeners' Chronicle quotes 

 some Continental authority who pronounces this the pearl of 

 all existing varieties. It is not furnished with runners, and the 

 leaves are of a glittering green color, which is a particular 

 merit. The flower-stalk is long, the flowers larger than those of 

 the Russian, the color light blue, the fragrance powerful, and 

 in floriferousness it exceeds all other known Violets. Placed 

 in the greenhouse or in a cold frame in the autumn, it con- 

 tinues to bloom, and if at the end of the month of December 

 or beginning of the new year it can have the warmth of an 

 intermediate house, its season of flowering will be extended 

 into the spring. The cultivation of the plant is identical with 

 that commonly pursued with Violets. 



The notorious Italian slum in this city, which is called IVIul- 

 berry Bend, will be torn down shortly, and the space it covers 

 will form part of a new park, consisting of an irregular plot 

 bounded by Park, IMulberry, Bayard and Baxter streets. 

 Baxter Bend, an equally ill-favored quarter, will also dis- 

 appear, and the new park will touch the corner of 

 that little triangular breathing-space which was established 

 when the Five Points district was partially redeemed some 

 years ago, and which surely bears the most oddly optimistic 

 name of any such spot in the world — Paradise Park. The price 

 which the city will have to pay for the new park will be very 

 large, for land upon which so many human beings are crowded 

 commands at least ten dollars a square foot, and often more 

 than twice that amount ; but no money will be wasted if it in- 

 sures another playgroundfor the very poor, and at the same time 

 the destruction of the vilest rookeries which disgrace New 

 York. And yet, witli a strange inconsistency, while New York 

 is spending a million and a half of money to make room for a 

 little turf and a few trees here, some of her leading citizens are 

 beseeching the Legislature for the privilege of covering up 

 Bryant Park with a huge municipal building, others are trying 

 to confiscate City Hall Park for the same purpose, and others 

 still are endeavoring to destroy Central Park itself in the al- 

 leged interest of the American trotter. 



At the last convention of the American Forestry Association 

 Mr. Gifford Pinchot read a paper on the history of forest-pol- 

 icy, from which we quote the following: "The spirit of the 

 recent Swiss forest-legislation is one which must permeate 

 our own coming forest-laws if they are to win that acceptance 

 with the people without which they must be worse than use- 

 less. It has been summarized as follows by Professor Landolt : 

 ' Our forest-laws are intended to work more through instruc- 

 tion, good example and encouragement than, by severe regu- 

 lations. This method is somewhat slower than one which 

 should involve more drastic measures, but the results achieved 

 are more useful and lasting. When forest-proprietors do 

 something because they are convinced of its utility, it is done 

 well and with an eye to the future ; but what they do under 

 compulsion is done carelessly and neglected at the first op- 

 portunity. What they have come to learn in this way, and 

 have recognized as good, will be carried out, and that better 

 and better from year to year.' This homely statement of the 

 great Swiss forester is full of the wise moderation of a man 

 conscious of the dignity of his work. Successful forest-reform, 

 here as there, must be a growth from the education of the 

 people, finding its expression in laws which respect both the 

 needs of the forest and the needs of the people, and which 

 waste no time in mistakes. Such legislation is respected, be- 

 cause it is capable of being enforced. The results of it are so 

 large, it is so surely a part of the future, that the friends of for- 

 estry in America ought to work for it with the steady vigor of 

 men who know they are going to win." 



An account of that district of southern France which is 

 called the Camargue, recently published in the Revue Indus- 



trielle, shows how extensive and how successful are the works 

 of irrigation undertaken by the French Government. This 

 district occupies- the triangular space formed by the two 

 branches of the Rhone in their course between the point of 

 forking and the Mediterranean, and although in mediaeval 

 years it contained important seaport-towns, for generations it 

 has been a malarious waste, where the ancient cities presented 

 astonishing pictures of death and decay, and where the bound- 

 less fields were given over to wandering herds of half-savage 

 cattle. The district being really an island, composed entirely 

 of alluvium brought down by the river, it was often partly over- 

 flowed ; so the first need was to build dykes to protect it. 

 Then ditches were dug and pumps set up for the removal of 

 the water which soaked into the soil beneath the dykes, and 

 this water was thrown into a great basin called the etang Val- 

 cares, which was furnished with an outlet to the sea. Then, 

 as the land would thus have been rendered too dry, irrigating 

 canals and pumps were established to bring in water from the 

 Rhone at the upper part of the territory, and as by this means 

 certain portions could also be flooded if desired for the de- 

 struction of the phylloxera, large plantations of the Vine were 

 made. The cliniate is excellent for grape-cultivation ; pas- 

 turage also became profitable, and certain new plants, among 

 them the Australian "Salt-bush," have been introduced 

 with a prospect of commercial success. Thus, according to 

 the Revue, a desert region dangerous to health has been trans- 

 formed into a fertile stretch of country which is rapidly grow- 

 ing more and more populous, and a network of railways has 

 been begun to develop its resources to the full. 



In the last number of Agricultural Science there is an ac- 

 count of a new edible Blackberry, by Professor Bailey, which, 

 in honor of Dr. C. F. Millspaugh, who collected it at an altitude 

 of 3,500 feet in West Virginia something more than a year ago, 

 is called Rubus Millspaughi. It is a bush Blackberry with long 

 wand-like canes and destitute of thorns. Dr. Britton, who 

 named it, knew of no other specimens than those of Mill- 

 spaugh except a single leaf of it in Linnaeus' Herbarium, in 

 London, collected by Kalm more than a century ago. Professor 

 Bailey thinks, however, that it is generally distributed over the 

 northern and eastern states, since he has had good specimens 

 of it from the Big Smoky Mountains, in North Carolina, at 6,000 

 feet altitude, and he knows of other specimens from the White 

 Mountains, and the Keweenaw Peninsida, Lake Superior, so 

 that it would appear that the species grows upon our northern 

 borders and follows the mountains southward, which accounts 

 for the fact that Kalm found the specimen in Canada. This 

 Blackberry has some importance to horticulturists on account 

 of its thornless canes. The so-called thornless Blackberries of 

 gardens are nothing but comparatively unarmed forms of 

 Rubus villosus. The fruit of this plant is said to be good. Mr. 

 Kofoid, who collected it in North Carolina, writes that as late 

 as August 29th the fruit was just ripening to a faint reddish 

 tinge, and was quite palatable even then. The natives say that 

 the fruit ripens in September. The berries are large, long, 

 slender and sweet, lacking the acid and bitterish quality of 

 berries on the lower mountains. Besides the absence of 

 thorns, whicli distinguishes this species from Rubus villosus, 

 it lacks the pubescent character of the common species, the 

 leaves are thin, the leaflets sharply toothed and prominent ; on 

 vigorous shoots the leaflets are five, and the three upper ones 

 have stalks from one to two inches long. 



Catalogues Received. 



The De Laval Separator Co., 74 Cortlandt Street, New York ; 

 Cream Separators. — M. V. Dickens, Trumansburg, N. Y. ; Fruit and 

 Ornamental Trees, Grape Vines, Small Fruits, Shrubs, Roses, etc. — 

 T. J. DwYER, Cornwall, N. Y. ; Choice Small Fruits, Trees, Shrubs 

 and Vines. — Ellw anger & Barry, Rochester, N. Y. ; Small Fruits 

 and Fruit Trees, Ornamentat Trees, Shrubs, Pseonies, Hardy Border 

 Plants, Roses, etc. — Hilfinger Bros., Fort Edward, N. Y. ; Trade 

 Pricedist of Standard Flower Pots, Vases, Seed Pans, and Cylinders 

 for Cut Flowers- — Harlan P. Kelsey, Linville, N. C; Special Spring 

 Offers and Wholesale Catalogue of Native Trees, Flowering Shrubs 

 and Plerbaceous Perennial Plants. — ^Jacob W. M.\nning, Reading, 

 Mass. ; Descriptive Illustrated Catalogues of Some Recently Intro- 

 duced Trees, Shrubs, Vines and Hardy Herbaceous Perennials ; 

 Large and Small Fruits ; Ornamental Trees, Shrubs and Climbing- 

 Vines ; Choice Hardy Perennials. — Pitcher & Manda, Short Hills, 

 N. J.; Special Importation of Orchids. — O. M. Richardson, Canton, 

 Oxford Co., Me. ; Northern-grown Flower and Vegetable Seeds. — 

 Texas Pecan and Seed Co., Fort Worth, Texas; Pecan Nuts for Seed. 

 — David G. Yates & Co., Germantown Ave., Philadelphia, Pa. ; 

 Evergreens, Ornamental and Fruit Trees, Shrubs, Roses, Greenhouse 

 and Bedding Plants. 



