270 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 489. 



B. E. Fernow. 



lems. The author states modestly enough that when he took 

 the field he had "very indefinite ideas" as to the object to 

 be attained, and began " with partially unformed purposes. " 

 This may account largely for the lack of form in the results. 

 The author is a thorough woodman and good observer, 

 and his contributions to practical forestry will, no doubt, 

 gain in value with experience. 



Washington, D. C. 



Notes. 



The degree of Master of Arts has been eonf erred by Harvard 

 University upon Mr. C. E. Faxon for his attainments in science 

 and art. The readers of Garden and Forest know some- 

 thing of the substantial quality of his botanical knowledge and 

 of his skill as a botanical draughtsman. 



A very striking display was made at Floral Park during the 

 last week in June when four acres of Japanese Irises were in 

 flower. Nearly one acre is devoted to a pure white sort named 

 Gold Bound, while the dark purple kinds are best represented 

 by the variety Mahogany. The pale mauve of Exquisite 

 and the bright blue of Blue Jay indicate some of the colors 

 through which these flowers range. Individual flowers are 

 said to measure nearly ten inches in diameter and single plants 

 carry from twenty to twenty-five spikes. 



A correspondent of The Gardeners' Chronicle writes from 

 Manilla of a remarkable Dendrobium, a new species which has 

 been named Victorise reginae, in commemoration of the 

 Queen's jubilee. The plant grows at an altitude of 6,000 feet 

 and higher, and the branching stems produce great numbers 

 of richly dark blue and white blossoms borne in trusses and 

 lasting for several weeks. The flowers are more than an inch in 

 diameter, the petals at the base being white, with a large blue 

 blotch at the edges, the lip ovate, oblong and of the same color. It 

 is, without doubt, one of the most striking of the Dendrobiums. 



Professor Bailey and Mr. Wilhelm Miller have issued another 

 bulletin on the Chrysanthemum which contains much that is 

 of interest to florists and flower lovers generally. Mr. Miller's 

 chapter entitled "Chrysanthemums at Home" is certainly 

 worth publishing under the Nixon Act, and perhaps the horti- 

 cultural knowledge which can be disseminated by investiga- 

 tions and publications of this character justify the use of the 

 costly machinery of the experiment station in this particular 

 direction. The question is whether it could not be used to 

 better advantage elsewhere. But since the bulletin is pub- 

 lished primarily for educational purposes, we must express 

 our regret at the use of such a barbarism as " mum " for 

 Chrysanthemum. A subject which is of sufficient importance 

 to be discussed in a bulletin from a university ought to com- 

 mand the use of dignified and scholarly language. 



What is said to be the largest sale of Mediterranean fruit 

 ever made in this country took place in this city on Monday of 

 last week, when the cargoes of three steamers were disposed 

 of. Almost 45,000 packages of oranges and lemons were bid 

 off in the auction, which lasted five and three-quarter hours. 

 The sales aggregated almost $75,000, or $200 for each minute 

 1 if that time. When it is considered that the report of an ex- 

 pected cold wave influenced the demand for lemons unfavor- 

 ably, and that the sales were in as small lots as five boxes and 

 upward, the sustained energy of the auctioneer and the gen- 

 eral business dispatch are better realized. A cargo of the 

 same fruits was disposed of on each succeeding day of last 

 week, and the week's sales amounted to 30,300 boxes of Sor- 

 rento, Palermo, Messina, Rodi and Catania oranges and 

 122,050 boxes of Messina, Palermo, Maiori and Sorrento lemons. 



The United States Department of Agriculture has just issued 

 the first number of a new series of brief popular bulletins 

 based upon the work of the experiment stations for the pur- 

 pose of setting forth the practical side of certain features in 

 the progress of agricultural investigation. An introductory 

 note states that this work must not be depended upon to lay 

 down any " rules for farming," and that the results reported 

 are generally regarded as tentative and suggestive rather than 

 conclusive, leaving to the individual farmer the problem of 

 applying the results of experiments to his own peculiar condi- 

 tions. This bulletin of thirty pages treats of a dozen topics, 

 and every paragraph is full of instruction. A chapter of three 

 pages devoted to the subject of barnyard-manure is exception- 

 ally good in its treatment of a subject of prime practical im- 

 portance and one that has been the study of the most eminent 

 agricultural chemists ever since agricultural chemistry has 



been a science. How to manage and preserve this product in 

 an economical way without losing any of its fertilizing value is 

 a problem in which every cultivator of the soil is vitally inter- 

 ested, and in these few paragraphs some of the results of the 

 latest researches of the leading experimenters in the country 

 are explained in clear and simple language. 



The Rural New Yorker regrets that Magnolia hypoleuca is 

 still a rare tree in the United States, and, indeed, it is remark- 

 able that so beautiful a tree remains comparatively unknown, 

 although it was sent to the United States thirty-two years ago 

 from Japan by Thomas Hogg. We published a figure of it in 

 the first volume of Garden and Forest, taken from a tree 

 which was planted with many other rare Japanese plants at 

 the foot of Eighty-fourth Street, in this city, in 1865, where 

 it may still be standing, although an alteration in the grade 

 of the street has left it bruised and hidden behind a bank 

 of earth. The foliage is light bright green above and pale 

 steel-blue or almost silvery beneath, and its large flowers 

 exhale an odor which by some is thought to resemble that of 

 a pineapple, while others describe it as a combination of the 

 wintergreen and the fruit of the banana. They have cream- 

 white petals and scarlet filaments, and are six or seven inches 

 across when fully expanded. In this city these flowers 

 appear early in June, after the tree is in full leaf. It is a com- 

 mon forest-tree in the northern island of Japan, where it attains 

 a height of a hundred feet or more with a trunk diameter of 

 nearly two feet. 



Bartlett, Lawson, Beurre Gifford, Comet, Wilder and Law- 

 rence pears were among the fruits in sixty-one car-loads 

 received here from California last week, with Alexander 

 apples, and peaches, plums, prunes and cherries in extended 

 variety. It is interesting to note the trade in dried fruits so 

 late in the season, and evaporated apples, raspberries, huckle- 

 berries, blackberries, cherries, apricots, peaches and plums of 

 last year's crop are sold in the home markets and exported in 

 considerable quantities. The highest grade of evaporated apples 

 are still in demand for shipment abroad, and nearly 1,700 boxes 

 of dried fruits and raisins left this port for Liverpool alone last 

 week, while 850 packages of dried California fruits were shipped 

 to Hamburg. So late as June 19th the weekly output of dried 

 prunes from San Jose, California, amounted to above 45,000 

 pounds. Other exports of fruits and vegetables which suggest 

 the complex demands of trade are 900 crates of bananas 

 shipped to England during the past fortnight, and 245 barrels 

 of winter apples. Several thousand barrels of American pota- 

 toes leave this port for Cuba each week at this season, and the 

 first consignment for this year of fresh California fruits, con- 

 sisting of five car-loads, was started from that state for London 

 on June 29th and is due in England about July 13th. 



A bulletin just issued by the Agricultural Experiment Station 

 at Alabama gives an account of some hybrids between Ameri- 

 can and foreign Cotton-plants which were tested last year. 

 Seeds of foreign varieties which had been acclimated by plant- 

 ing in the United States, from different parts of India and from 

 Egypt, were crossed both with the Long Staple and Short 

 Staple varieties grown in the United States. Sea Island Cotton, 

 which belongs to the species Gossypium maritimum, sells for 

 twelve cents a pound, but the demand is greater than the 

 supply, and therefore the Long Staple Cottons of Egypt find 

 ready market here. Fifty thousand bales of this cotton were 

 sold in the United States in 1896, and buyers were glad to pay 

 eleven cents a pound for it. Without giving in detail the 

 results of hybridization, it may be said that many of the Indian 

 Cottons, as, for example, those derived from G. hirsutum, did 

 not blend with certain American kinds, but some of the 

 Egyptian forms which are varieties of G. maritimum, to which 

 our Sea Island Cotton is referred, combine well with this type. 

 Mr. Mell, the experimenter, concludes that the hybrids be- 

 tween the Egyptian and American kinds are generally equal 

 to the parents in good qualities, and the Egyptian kinds make 

 better fibre in length of strand, in strength and texture, than 

 the Indian kinds. The Sea Island Cotton in combination with 

 two of the Egyptian varieties produces a superior grade of 

 staple, and the plant is rather prolific, so that there seems to 

 be a prospect of securing a variety which will be a healthy, 

 long-staple, upland cotton. A blending of small-boiled species 

 with large-boiled species is not advised, since the resulting 

 cross is generally weak, but when plants referred to G. mari- 

 timum, which is slow in maturing its bolls, so that frost often 

 catches them before they are open, are united with a suitable 

 strain of G. hirsutum, the hybrid reaches maturity quicker and 

 is more prolific, and the combination of these species yields a 

 plant which produces fibre of the best grade in strength, 

 maturity, twist, length, fineness and yield to the acre. 



