IVINDFALLS. 



575 



with their cousins of the garden. If you wait till late 

 to put out the bed, give it a covering of hemlock boughs, 

 and when you remove them in spring sprinkle mignon- 

 ette or pansy or poppy seed thinly all over the bed and 

 you will have pleasure in that plot of earth all summer. 

 If you manure the bed it is best to leave the lilies out, 

 as they are often killed by too much fertilizing. — S. A. 

 Little, N. Y. 



A Climbing Currant. — Growing in the garden of a 

 neighbor is a veritable climbing currant. The plant was 

 found when quite small growing in a thicket, and was 

 taken up and set in a kitchen garden. After a while 

 its climbing proclivities were made manifest, some 

 three or four years ago, and it was then transplanted to 

 a position beside the house and trained up like any 

 other climber, as shown in the illustration. When the 

 photograph was taken it measured ii feet 8 inches in 

 height. The photograph was taken in autumn, and by 

 July i2th following 

 the plant measured 12 

 feet 8 inches, showing 

 a new growth of 15 

 inches in one season. 

 On July 1 2th there 

 seemed to be fully a 

 bushel of fruit upon 

 the plant. The qual- 

 ity is not equalled by 

 anything I ever saw, 

 even Fay's Prolific 

 suffering by contrast. 

 Has any other reader 

 seen a tendency to 

 climb in any member 

 of the currant family ? 



A. H. GODDARD, 



Chaiitamjiia Co., N. Y. 



Carpenteria Cati- 

 fornica. — This was 

 named in honor of 

 Judge Carpenter of 

 Louisiana. It is a de- 

 ciduous shrub, with beautiful white flowers that look like 

 the Cherokee rose. A native of the Sierra Nevada mount- 

 ains. King's river, Fresno county ; brought to notice by 

 General Fremont and very little cultivated. It is known^ 

 however, in England, to which country it was carried 

 some 50 years ago by English botanists. The flower is 

 not entirely scentless, as described by Professor Green 

 in his botany, but has a slight pink perfume. The height 

 of the shrub after growing some 10 or 12 years in the 

 University of California grounds is about five feet. 

 And I presume as the native home of the shrub is in the 

 Sierras, it will be hardy in the eastern states. It is 

 worthy of cultivation. — Emil Kellner, California . 



Popinac or Acacia Farnesiana. — I read the dis- 

 cussion on the popinac some time back, and add my 

 quota to the general fund. It is identical in bloom and 

 foliage with the wesachu of Texas ; in the western part 



of the state it makes immense trees. In South Caro- 

 lina, where I first saw it, I have seen it growing out of 

 doors as far north as Columbia, but it blooms in the 

 fall and the bean or seed pod does not have time to ripen 

 before frost. In the lower part of the state the seed 

 pod ripens abundantly. The popinac is also indigen- 

 ous to Florida. Here in Texas it does not bloom in the 

 fall as in South Carolina, but in the spring. There is 

 one in bloom here now (May). I do not think it blooms 

 regularly in the fall, but many species that bloom in 

 spring in other climates blossom here in the spring and 

 fall or late summer ; for instance, AiuarylUs Jolinsonii 

 blooms in this way. The very dry summers of Texas 

 produced this change, I presume, in the popinac. It 

 died down during the drouth and put up too late to bloom 

 in the fall, and the mild winters made it a spring 

 bloomer. Dahlias and many other flowers I have seen 

 die down here in a dry season, and sprout up and bloom 



again in autumn. Al- 

 most every year Irish 

 potatoes make a vol- 

 unteer crop in the 

 same way, and a fine 

 fall crop can be made 

 by drying the small- 

 est unmatured pota- 

 toes in the shade and 

 then replanting them 

 in August before the 

 rains that come al- 

 m o s t unfailingly in 

 that month. We have 

 many lessons from 

 nature, and by copy- 

 ing her methods we 

 can have spring flow, 

 ers and vegetables in 

 autumn. — Mrs. H. K. 

 W., Biyan, Texas. 



Fragrant Single 

 Violets. — On page 

 364, The American 

 Garden, the statement is made : "All the cultivated vio- 

 lets have, hitherto, without exception, been double. 

 Single violets, until this discovery of Mr. Cumming's, 

 have been without perfume," etc. 



This is a mistake. In this section is cultivated a 

 single violet, both blue and white, whose fragrance can- 

 not be excelled by any double violet which ever grew. 

 I know whereof I write, because I am a New Englander, 

 and was familiar with the double violet before I came 

 south to live. To show you how very fragrant these 

 single violets are, I will tell you that early in the 

 winter I passed by my violet bed and the perfume 

 attracted my attention ("the time of violets was not 

 yet "). I searched and found four blooms. I brought 

 them into my room, which is quite large, 17x22, and upon 

 my husband's return, as he stepped over the threshold, 

 he asked : " Have you violets in the room ? " They are 



