APRIL 1 TO JUNE 30, 1912. 



45 



33695 to 33709— Contiuued. 



33702. Greigia sp. 



''(No. 997.) The first I have seen growing in central Chile. Found very- 

 near the seacoast. Is a new variety." 



33703. CucuMis melo L. Muskmelon. 



" (No. 1185.) By Chilean custom, irrigated fields are rented to the dry farmers 

 in lots of 1 cuadra (4 acres) to each renter for their ' chacra.' The rental price is 

 a contracted number of sacks of beans. In these chacras are planted beans, 

 potatoes, com, squashes, aji, muskmelons, and watermelons. As squashes and 

 melons have the natural faculties of aerohybridization these notes refer to this 

 phenomena and give my opinion of the causes of the excellence created in 

 Chilean melons. 



"A hundred or more tenants have adjoining lands in which to sow and plant 

 their food crops. No attention is given to the seeds planted, except squashes 

 and melons, and such care as may be given is unknown to the persons them- 

 selves. When a squash is cooked or a melon eaten, if they are exceptionally- 

 good as to sweetness, flavor, productiveness, etc., the seeds are saved and are 

 generally put into a bag hung for this purpose. This is repeated until sufficient 

 mixed seed is accumulated. In this manner a large variety of all good selected 

 seeds are sown the next year. Each tenant does the same thing, only with a 

 diflFerent assortment. Therefore, each field is yearly sown with a hundred or 

 more different collections of seeds, selected especially by taste and not by sight. 

 Atoms of pollen are distributed great distances, and as no two melon patches 

 are a greater distance than 60 meters apart, the aerial hybridizing commences 

 and ends with the bloom. In this way every melon ripens with its seeds crossed 

 by some other or others of equal, but perhaps different, merits. Every year 

 new kinds of melons are created and these ignorant people are selectors by taste 

 instead of scientific attainments. There are no people better able to judge of 

 melon quality than these, as they live upon them during the season. As this 

 breeding process of continually crossing improved varieties takes place year 

 after year, it is not surprising that Chilean melons have reached a high degree 

 of excellence. 



"The seed sent was a production of this year, having flavor, quantity, and 

 character of its own and was firm enough to be a good shipper. If its merits can 

 be reproduced it is extra good, but as they are already crossed there is no 

 security." 



33704. Lycopersicox esculentum Miller. Tomato. 

 "(No. 1188.) A smooth yellow variety from Germany, grown in Chile for 



many years. Medium size, mild and fine flavored, prolific. By mild I mean 

 it hr-s little acid or of an agreeable kind." 



33705. Eugenia temu Hook, and Arn. 



" (No. 1189.) * Temu.^ This is the first temu I have found bearing fruit, and 

 I consider this an extra valuable find. The fruit is perfectly round, black, 

 glossy, with a good quantity of juicy, wine-colored flesh. The flavor is aromatic 

 and agreeable, something like wintergreen berries. It has no sort of repug- 

 nance. Its size for each tree is the same, that is, all the fruit on a tree is 

 exactly alike, no large and no small ones. Some trees bear fruit a trifle larger 

 than others; the smallest size is three-eighths of an inch in diameter, the 

 largest half an inch. Each berry has but one seed, which readily separates 

 from the flesh. It is prolific to excess, the tree being black with fruit. 



"The glossy leaves are fragrant and evergreen; they fall, but not until after 

 the new ones are formed. In bloom the tree is charmingly white with a mass 

 of delightfully fragrant flowers which perfume the adjacent air for some dis- 



