July ii, 1894.] 



Garden and Forest. 



279 



small ones no seed at all. It ripens with the first named, is 

 yellow, of excellent quality, and bears abundantly. 



Josephine. This I discovered on the edge of the river-bank 

 a few miles from here, and now have a fine tree from grafts. 

 It also commences to ripen before frost, and is of superior 

 quality, but has plenty of seed. I have measured specimens 

 of this variety two inches in diameter. 



St. Thomas. This ripens after frosts, and the fruit dries on 

 the tree, so that a peck was gathered from it in March the fol- 

 lowing year, when the cedar-birds commenced to eat them. 

 The fruit must be fully ripe before it loses its astringency, 

 then it is delicious. 



Marion. This variety bears the largest fruit of any in my 

 collection, and has but few seeds. Out of eleven fruits I 

 counted but fifteen seeds. The quality is not quite so high as 

 that of some others, but its large size and few seeds make it 

 valuable. J. H. Marion, of Fulton, Callaway County, Missouri, 

 is its originator, and he is propagating it, I understand. This 

 variety needs frost to ripen it. 



Ruby. This is a seedling, and the fruit, although small, is 

 so handsome and the foliage is so abundant that it is worth 

 planting. The fruit hangs on all winter. 



Of seedlings raised about one-half will be barren, but the sex 

 of the tree can be distinguished at its first blossoming. The 

 fertile flower is not very beautiful, but that of the barren tree 

 is something of the form of Lily-of-the-valley, and is very 

 sweet. 

 Bluffton, Mo. S- Miller. 



Woodlands of New England. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — I have more than once stated that I cannot but regard 

 the impression erroneous that. northern New England is being 

 rapidly divested of its forests, and is liable, therefore, to be- 

 come a dry and barren waste. After a residence of nearly 

 thirty years in northern Vermont, with occasional trips through 

 various portions of the upper Connecticut valley and north- 

 eastern Maine, I still find ample grounds to sustain my belief 

 that while trees valuable for timber in the more accessible 

 parts along the water-courses have been considerably thinned 

 out, and that the cut, as now shown by the annual "drives" 

 down the Connecticut, the Kennebec and the Penobscot rivers, 

 is made up mainly of a considerably smaller growth than 

 those which were familiar to me as a native resident of the 

 Kennebec valley between 1828 and 1849, yet the actual extent 

 of these great forests, and their present value as a source of 

 future supply, is very slightly impaired. 



Aside from the great timber-forests, there was a time be- 

 tween 1850 and 1870 when the woodlands along the lines of 

 railroads were being rapidly denuded of their smaller tree- 

 growth for locomotive fuel and for charcoal. But this ceased 

 almost at once when mineral, coal and coke were found to be 

 cheaper and better for nearly all uses. A recent and some- 

 what extended trip through such forest-territory really aston- 

 ished me when I noted how rapidly all of it had been again 

 covered with a thrifty growth, which has filled all gaps, and is, 

 in fact, encroaching to a considerable extent upon once culti- 

 vated fields. 



Some persons who have read my statements on this sub- 

 ject have rather hastily assumed that I hold the belief that a 

 let-alone policy is all that is required in this matter. That is a 

 mistake. I well understand that forests, like farms, may de- 

 teriorate ; and will deteriorate of necessity without intelligent 

 care. As a farmer, and as a writer for the press, I have been 

 always urgent for sound teaching in our agricultural colleges 

 upon all subjects connected with woodlands as well as plow- 

 lands. I have looked for such institutions to furnish us with 

 men capable of rightly caring for and managing all landed 

 property. But I think many readers who criticise me are un- 

 aware of the fact that our great owners of forest-lands — per- 

 haps I should say timber-lands — are not all ignorant regarding 

 their interests in this particular. Such men are in many ways 

 careful of those interests, and have their rules as to systematic 

 cutting, as well as to the prevention of damage by fire. If 

 really competent foresters were to be had — men who fully 

 understand our American forests and their conditions — I be- 

 lieve that supervisory work would be ready for them. There 

 is an immense amount of money invested in New England 

 woodlands; and owners are far from being indifferent in re- 

 gard to their management and preservation. But as yet expert 

 foresters, who understand American needs and conditions, 

 are very few in number. 



Newport, Vt. -<• J~t- Jrloskins. 



Recent Publications. 



With the Wild Flowers. By E. M. Hardinge. New 

 York : Baker & Taylor Co. 



This little book is another attempt to bring before young 

 people some of the elementary facts of botany and to ex- 

 plain some of the intricacies of vegetable structure in fa- 

 miliar language. Of course, it is not possible to go very 

 profoundly into the science of botany or any other science, 

 in fact, without the use of technical terms, and most efforts 

 of this kind must fail in point of clearness and accuracy. 

 It is a mistake to suppose that people who are really desir- 

 ous of learning anything have minds so sluggish that they 

 cannot acquire the language of that science as fast as it is 

 needed. Mr. Hardinge asserts in his preface that such words 

 as "dicotyledons," " angiosperms " and " polypetalous" 

 " excite loathing " in the pupil. But this is an exaggerated 

 statement. Whenever the necessity arises for inviting at- 

 tention to an object or a process there is need of a word to 

 describe the thing or the action, and while it is true that 

 language ought always to be plain and easily understood, 

 and that it is foolish to use words beyond a pupil's intelli- 

 gence, nevertheless it is always indispensable that his 

 knowledge of scientific terms should keep pace with his 

 knowledge of scientific facts. Scientific language properly 

 used is never a hindrance and always a help, and one who 

 is apt to teach can make the study of the words and phrases 

 which it is necessary to employ quite as interesting as the 

 study of the plants the student is investigating. 



The separate chapters of this book are not logically con- 

 nected, but they treat of different subjects which are 

 suggested as the season advances. Indeed, the matter 

 contained in the book has appeared before in the form of 

 contributions to different periodicals, and this will account 

 for its lack of system. This is no objection, however, to a 

 book of this character, the chief value of which is to arrest 

 attention and to excite in the young reader an interest in 

 plants and prompt him to examine them for himself. No 

 one can acquire any considerable knowledge of botany by 

 reading what some one else has written about it. When- 

 ever a boy or a girl begins seriously to examine plants and 

 their structure, to compare them, to mark their points of 

 similarity and difference, he has entered the path which 

 will ultimately lead, if he continues to walk in it, to a 

 knowledge which is genuine and scientific so far as it 

 goes. The subjects of the book are well chosen to arouse 

 such an interest, and although it is written in a style that 

 is rather too intense for the subject, it is a good book to 

 give to bright young people to read during their summer 

 vacation. The illustrations are better than those of most 

 other books of its class. 



Glimpses of the Plant World. By Fanny D. Bergen. 

 Fully illustrated. Ginn & Co., Boston. 



Miss Bergen's book is somewhat less ambitious than the 

 one noticed above. She talks to children about the beauty 

 of early awakening nature, the charm of wild flowers, and 

 adds a little about plants of low degree, such as the Mush- 

 rooms, the Yeast Plants, the Sea-weeds, the Ferns. Then 

 the structure of the flowers and their seed-bearing are 

 explained in a familiar way easy of comprehension to a 

 small child, and yet accurately and practically. The descrip- 

 tions are illustrated plentifully with well-drawn pictures. 

 Books of this character, although not strictly scientific in 

 method, have a genuine value, so long as their statements 

 are accurate, since they tend to give an impulse to a child's 

 life which may develop into an ardent love for nature, and 

 this in maturer years will help to brighten life with one of 

 its purest and most satisfying pleasures. 



Notes. 



Two-tenths of an inch only of rain, precipitated in one short 

 thunder-shower, fell in the neighborhood of Boston during the 

 month of June. This is probably the smallest recorded rain- 



