630 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



for some years past hundreds of thousands of seedHngs of it have 

 been raised in the United States of America for grafting purposes, 

 which fact alone would suggest that it must be in some way superior, 

 or our very practical American cousins would not be so keen for it. 

 It has also been somewhat extensively used in Austraha, and is not 

 unknown in South Africa. The United States alone is said to take 

 twelve to fifteen hundred pounds weight of seed a year. It is a fairly 

 common plant in the Northern Island of Japan, from whence the seed 

 is exported. It is described as being " a strong, healthy, vigorous- 

 growing tree with good foliage calculated to withstand diseases and 

 pests," and it is these qualities which, it is suggested, make it such 

 a favourite stock in the States. We are a little sceptical of its merits, 

 but it should certainly be tried in this country. We understand that 

 sample seeds can be obtained from Mr. Unger, Schlierbach, Heidelberg, 

 Germany. 



Beitish Columbia. 



We are constantly being consulted and asked many questions by 

 Fellows who have friends thinking of going out to British Columbia. 

 We have therefore collected a few of the more prominent details 

 relating to one of the more immediately fruit-growing districts of that 

 rapidly increasing Colony. 



British Columbia is on the Western or Pacific Coast side of Canada. 

 It enjoys a climate not colder in winter than ours here in England, 

 and far less changeable and capricious. In summer it is decidedly 

 warmer and more sunny, but at the same time is seldom without fresh 

 breezes from the snow-clad mountains on the north-east and south-east, 

 and from the Pacific Ocean on the west. 



British Columbia must not be confused with Colombia, which is a 

 South American State of more or less Spanish origin, and lies in the 

 blaze of the Tropics, just south of the Isthmus of Panama. It is hardly 

 possible to imagine two countries more unlike each other than Colombia 

 in the south and British Columbia in the north, separated by the vast 

 stretches of the Isthmus of Panama, Mexico, California, and Oregon. 



Notes on the Feuit-growing Disteict of Veenon, 

 Beitish Columbia. 



Vernon, the chief city of Okanagan Valley, has a population of 

 about three thousand people, and lies about forty-five miles south of 

 the Canadian Pacific Railway, witli which it has daily train communi- 

 cation. 



At an elevation of about twelve hundred feet, Vernon is most 

 advantageously situated as a centre from which radiate excellent roads 

 leading to the northern towns of the Valley, to Coldstream, White 

 Valley, and the rapidly growing large district about and beyond Lumby, 

 and to Grand Prairie and Kamloops. Daily communication is also 

 kept up with the towns on Okanagan Lake by swift steamers, equal in 

 comfort and speed to anything in British Columbia. 



