772 



HORTICULTURE 



HOSACKIA 



pie a custom as selling native fruit brought to town in 

 season by the neighboring farmer became at all general 

 with the old New York grocers." The first bananas were 

 imported into the United States in 1804, but "it was not 

 until 1830 and later that the importation o" foreiga fruit 

 was considered seriously." "In 1832 there arrived at 

 New York by sailing ship the first cargo of oranges 

 from Sicily. Lemons followed almost immediately, and 

 the Mediterranean fruit trade became a recognized in- 

 terest from that time." The fruits came to be sold 

 largely by auction. About 1805 the wholesale commis- 

 sion business bad "come to be a generally recognized 

 feature of the fruit trade, many of the Italian growers 

 * * consii^ning tbeir fruit directly to American firms." 

 "About 1880, tlie third and last change in the methods 

 governing the Italian fruit trade began with the estab- 

 lishment here of representatives of several of the large 

 Italian houses." "Prior to the civil war and for several 

 years afterward, the small fruits of New York, New 

 Jersey, Long Island and Delaware were the only com- 

 petitors of the foreign fruit. * * * Such was the 

 condition of affairs in 1867, when the first consignment 

 of green fruit from California was shipped by express 

 to New York." 



L. O. Thayer, editor of "Cold Storage," New York, 

 estimates that there are in the United States (in 1000) 

 920 cold stores, excluding 300 used exclusively for meat. 

 Of this 920 he says that 700 are fitted for the" storing of 

 fruits, produce, eggs, butter, etc. The capacity of tliese 

 700 is sometliing like 35,000,000 cubic feet, or a yearly 

 capacity of 980,000,000 pounds. He also says that there 

 are aliout 220,000 refrigerator cars in use in this coun- 

 try; of this number about 50.000 are used for transpor- 

 tation of perishable products and the remainder for 

 meats. Almost every cold store works to its fullest ca- 

 pacity at least nine months of the year. In Canada 

 there are 40 cold stores, about 30 of them being fitted 

 for butter, etrgs and produce. Their capacity is about 

 200,000 cubic^feet. 



Conclusion. — The one most significant thing in 

 American Horticulture is the fact that it is American. 

 Ideals, methods, varieties, implements, are unique. 

 Even the species of plants which we cultivate are often 

 peculiar to ourselves. This is particularly true in the 

 fruits, for the native wild species have given us our 

 grapes, raspberries, blackberries, dewberries, mulljer- 

 ries, cranberries, some gooseberries, many plums, some 

 apples, and various minor fruits. In other esculeijts, it 

 has given us the pumpkins and squashes, Indian corn, 

 beans and Jerusalem artichokes. Our native fiora has 

 enriched the flower gardens of our own country and of 

 the world. An inquiry made in 1891 showed that 2,416 

 species of the United States and Canada had been intro- 

 duced to cultivation. In that year, 1,929 of these species 

 were actually in the trade, and 1,500 had been introduced 

 into England. Even when the species are of Old World 

 origin, the varieties are American in most of those 

 types which have been long cultivated here. Very few 

 Old World apples and peaches are popular in North 

 America, and the number in pears, plums and other 

 fruits is constantly decreasing. The American carnation 

 is already of a different type from the European. One of 

 the strongly American features of our Horticulture is 

 the great proportionate development of the cut-fiower 

 industry; but the last few years have seen a relative 

 increase of pot-plant and decorative-plant demands. 

 These divergencies are likely to increase rather than 

 diminish. The tendencies which differentiate our Horti- 

 culture from that of the Old World will also differentiate 

 the Horticulture of each geographical area of our own 

 country, thereby giving each area the varieties and the 

 methods which are best adapted to it. 



The second most significant thing in our Horticulture 

 is its strong commercial trend. This is [larficularly 

 true of fruit-growing and cut-flower-growing, which 

 have developed on a large-area basis (Figs. lOO.'i, 1095). 

 The flrst horticultural interest in this country was the 

 amateur or home-garden type. That type is'not dead, 

 and it will not die so long as hearts burn for the out- 

 of-doors and souls long for beauty and for the solace 

 of nearness to nature. Amateur or personal Horticul- 

 ture is increasing with great rapidity. It is a part of 

 the ripening of the home life and the acquiring of 



leisure. Persoiial gardening is intellectual employment. 

 The amateurs are the chief buyers of horticultural 

 books. Yet, for all this, the prevailing note in American 

 Horticulture is commercialism, and this note is the 

 stronger the farther one goes from the Atlantic sea- 

 board. Both types of Horticulture will increase. They 

 are not incompatible, but complementary. Both are 

 necessary to the greatest public weal. The commercial 

 type will always be the aspiration of the comparatively 

 few: it is coming more and more to be a profession. 

 The personal or amateur type will be increasingly the 

 hope of the many, for every person who has a home 

 wants a garden. 



Another important feature of our Horticulture is its 

 living literature. Persons may care nothing for books; 

 yet the literature of any subject is the measure of its 

 ideals. Persons may say that the books are theoretical 

 and beyond them; yet good books are always beyond, 

 else they are not good. There is no use for literature if 

 it does not inspire and point to better things. We meas- 

 ure the aspirations of any time by its writings. Whether 

 the fact be recognized or not, the literature of our Hor- 

 ticulture is an underlying force which slowly dominates 

 the thoughts and ideals of men. A book is a powerful 

 teacher. It states its propositions, and is silent; and 

 in the silence its lessons sink into the fiber of the mind. 

 More than GOO books have enriched American Horticul- 

 ture. Many of them have been poor, but even these may 

 have challenged controversy and have done good. The 

 early books were largely empirical and dogmatic. 

 Downing, for example, in 1845, says that tillage makes 

 better orchards, and he cites cases; but he does not 

 give reasons. He does not mention nitrogen, potash. 

 soil moisture, chemical activities. He does not even 

 mention plant-food in connection with tillage. The hori- 

 zon has widened since then. Men do not take up things 

 actively until they know the reasons. The poor farmer. 

 not know^ing reasons for anything, has no inspiration 

 and goes flshing. Thirty years ago, Colonel Waring was 

 the apostle of deep-plowing; yet one should plow neither 

 deep nor shallow until he knows why. Our literature 

 has been singularly devoid of principles and analysis. 

 The great writer is he who catches the significantmove- 

 ments and ideas of his time and portrays them to inspire 

 bis reader. Henderson first cauglit the rising commercial 

 spirit of our vegetable gardening; his "Gardening for 

 Profit" is the greatest American vegetable gardening 

 book, even if somewhat out of date as a book of practice. 

 The book of principles is now needed by the vegetable- 

 gardener. American pomology has several strong names 

 amongst its writers. Most of these writers have sacri- 

 ficed fundamental things to varieties. The first sustained 

 effort to write on fruit-growing from the point of view 

 of underlying principles was by Charles R. Baker, who 

 in 1800 published his "Practical and Scientific Fruit Cul- 

 ture." But the time was apparently not yet ready for a 

 book of this kind, and much of the discussion lacked 

 vital connection with the orchard. The book was too sug- 

 gestive of the study and the compiler. Coxe, KenricU, 

 Manning, Downing, Thomas, Warder, Barry, Fuller, 

 are significant names in American pomological litera- 

 ture. In floriculture there have been many excellenl 

 treatises, but there is not a single great or comprehen- 

 sive book. In recent years, the making of horticultural 

 literature is passing more and more from the workintr 

 horticulturist to the specially trained student ami 

 writer. 



The great development of American Horticulture, as 

 compared with European standards, has been in fruit 

 growing and its accessory manufactures, and cut-flow- 

 ers Its landscape planting is also a strong featxn*e, an<l 

 is increasing rapidly. Its cemetery planting is probably 

 the best in the world. In America, also, the development 

 of agricultural tools and appliances, and of spraying fur 

 insects and diseases, have reached their highest d^ 

 velopment. Other characteristic features of our Horti- 

 culture are its youth, and the vigor with which its scopi- 

 is enlarging. l, h. B. 



HOSACKia {David Hosack, professor of botany an<l 

 medicine in New York; author of HortusElginensis, 1811 ; 

 died 1835). Legnmindsir. Herbaceous plants, of which 

 3 species were once advertised by collectors of north- 



