September 15, 1897.] 



Garden and Forest. 



367 



on the lids, others stamp the boxes and crates containing the 

 highest grade, Fancy Elbertas, or Fancy Freestones, and those 

 holding the next grade, Choice Elbertas, or Choice Freestones. 

 The crates are carefully loaded into the high-boxed peach 

 wagons and driven slowly to the shipping shed at the railroad 

 siding. During the rush in the Elberta season two refrigerator 

 cars were dropped at the railroad station of the Olden fruit 

 farm every day. As soon as enough crates to fill a car are 

 piled on the platform they are deftly and rapidly packed in the 

 car, each box or crate being isolated by using inch-square 

 cleats horizontally and one and a half inch cleats vertically 

 between the packages, so that the cold air circulates freely 

 around every package. Four tons of ice are used in icing a 

 combination refrigerator ventilator-car. A fruit express train 

 picked up the cars every evening from near the Arkansas line 

 to Cedar Gap, making passenger time from that point to 

 Kansas City. ,_ „ , c 



Brighton, 111. Fanny Copley Seavey. 



The Dikeman Cherry. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir,— Referring to your note about the Dikeman Cherry, on 

 page 338, and which I saw as one of the judges at the New 

 York State Fair, this new variety seems to meet all the re- 

 quirements of a good late cherry that will bear shipping, and 

 does not decay. The cherries at the Slate Fair had been 

 picked on Friday, August 20th, in Michigan, and shipped 

 nearly 500 miles by express to Geneva, New York, then sent 

 to Syracuse and put on exhibition. They were in sound and 

 fresh condition, and I may add that on Saturday, August 28th, 

 I brought some of the fruit home with me that had been on 

 the plates during the whole week, and it is now, August 30th, 

 on my table perfectly sound after all this exposure. 



The Dikeman is a beautiful solid, meaty, black cherry of the 

 best quality. Taking these characteristics with its lateness and 

 shipping and keeping qualities, it is the most promising cherry 

 of which I know, and Mr. Willard is to be congratulated on 

 securing so valuable a prize. Mr. Willard found the cherry 

 growing in the light sandy soil of Oceana County, Michigan, a 

 short distance from the lake, the tree presumably a seedling. 

 A few buds were secured, and these were top-budded on some 

 bearing trees in Mr. Willard's orchard at Geneva, and from 

 these a few trees have been grown. 



I might also mention the President Wilder currant, of which 

 a remarkable exhibition was made at this fair by Mr. Willard. 

 The truit was large, clusters long and filled to the end with 

 beautiful berries which maintained their size along the entire 

 cluster. The fruit is of first quality and as large as that of the 

 Cherry currant, more juicy and with less seeds and acid than 

 any other variety of which I know. The leaves are thick and 

 large, the wood strong and loaded with an immense amount 

 of fruit. All these qualities must make it a popular and 

 profitable market currant. 



Lockport, N. Y. J . S. Woodward. 



Crested Begonias. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest: 



Sir, — An error in punctuation in my note on Crested Be- 

 gonias, September 8th, page 353, unfortunately confused the 

 description. It should read : " But sometimes attached to all 

 the petals, and sometimes only to either the inner or outer 

 pair, a growth springs from the lower section, though not 

 from base of petals." 



I might add that this growth is of the same texture and color 



as the petals, but is not in the nature of a doubling of parts. 



It seems to be simply a sportive growth in an entirely new 



direction. ,, _ , 



Elizabeth, N.J. J. N. Gerard. 



The Cheney Plum. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest: 



Sir, — In writing to Garden and Forest some weeks ago 

 regarding the ornamental value of Plum-trees I made special 

 mention of the variety propagated under the name of Cheney. 

 I have just now received some very fine specimens of the fruit 

 of this variety from Mr. John Craig, of the Central Experi- 

 mental Farms, Ottawa, Ontario. Though not so notably 

 prolific as some American varieties, Cheney bears fruit of a 

 very superior quality and appearance. Those sent by Mr. 

 Craig are somewhat unequally elliptical, with a longitudinal 

 diameter of 3.5 cm., and a transverse diameter of 3.1 cm., 

 with a visible suture ; bright dark red, with a very thin white 



bloom, almost without dots ; skin thick and firm ; flesh firm 

 yellow, of fine quality ; stone medium large, much flattened, 

 cling. As stated in my former communication, the tree is a 

 fine grower, and especially pretty in blossom. Professor 

 Bailey rates the fruit as good to very good, and says that this 

 is one of the best varieties. It seems to me to be a very satis- 

 factory example of the Nigra group of native plums — a group 

 very poorly represented in cultivated varieties as compared 

 with the western type of Prunus Americana. It is, therefore, 

 interesting as a type besides being useful as an ornamental 

 and as a fruit tree. 



University of Vermont. F. A. Waugh. 



Recent Publications. 



Our Native Birds of Song and Beauty. By Henry 

 Nehrling. Vol. II. George Brumder, Milwaukee, 1896. 



The first volume of this work was noticed in our issue of 

 April 1 8th, 1894, vol. vii., p. 159. The present and con- 

 cluding volume was completed early this year. It maybe 

 fairly said that the aim of the undertaking, the filling of a 

 gap between the very expensive and the merely technical 

 books on our ornithology and the combination of popular 

 biographies of our song birds with the presentation of 

 recognizable portraits of them, has been successfully at- 

 tained with a result that must be useful to a large class 

 of readers. The author has added to his own observations 

 made during residence and travel in various parts of the 

 country copious quotations from the best writers on the 

 subject, and this feature adds much to the value of the 

 book by putting the general reader in possession of a great 

 deal of interesting matter he would not be likely to meet 

 with otherwise. All technicalities have been carefully 

 avoided, the specific descriptions being appended in smaller 

 type. Interspersed throughout is much information about 

 plants, wild and cultivated, with both of which the author 

 is well acquainted, and the descriptions of scenery in 

 various parts of the country show him to be a true lover of 

 Nature. 



The plates, printed in colors from drawings by Ridgway, 

 Goeringand Muetzel, vary considerably in style and quality, 

 those of the German artists being overcrowded with figures 

 and overloaded with heavy backgrounds. Landscapes, as a 

 rule, do not add to the beauty of ornithological plates, and the 

 simpler the accessories the better. The figures of the birds are 

 generally well drawn and lifelike.and would, in our judgment, 

 look better without such elaborate surroundings. It would 

 have been better, too, to have preserved a more uniform 

 scale in the size of the figures. In the matter of typography 

 the red-lining of the page is not to our taste, but in other 

 respects the work is well printed. The popular interest in 

 ornithology has become so general in this country that a 

 work like the present cannot fail of large usefulness. 



Contributions from the United Slates National Museum, 

 vol. v., No. 3 : Studies of Mexican and Central American 

 Plants. By J. N. Rose. 



In this very interesting number of the Contributions Dr. 

 Rose has given the result of his careful studies not only of 

 the later collections from Mexico and Central America, but 

 of many of the older ones necessarily compared with them. 

 The plan of reporting on separate collections is abandoned 

 in view of the large number of sources from which the 

 plants have been received. The present plan of working 

 up the various collections jointly and reporting upon them 

 by genera or families, with at times revisions and synopses, 

 seems justified by the great body of material at hand, and 

 we think the result before us will be heartily endorsed. 

 Such synopses as those of Heliocarpus and Wimmeria will 

 be found very useful and suggestive, and the work in 

 family Cucurbitaceas shows the excellent judgment that 

 characterizes all of Dr. Rose's revisions. 



The large number of plates is a feature, seventeen of 

 them being given to the thirty-four pages of text. They 

 are as satisfactory as any that have been published in the 

 series. 



