460 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[December, 
he says of it, so that the responsibility will rest 
where it belongs. It is perhaps not too much to 
say that probably $5,000 worth of these mign- 
onettes -were last season sold to ten or fifteen 
thousand persons, not one In a thousand of 
whom but believes himself to have been 
swindled. The effect of this is damaging in 
the extreme, not only to us as seedsmen, but to 
the spread of horticultural taste, and it is to the 
interest of every one engaged in the business to 
frown down every such fraud. Last July, a 
special circular received from one of the leading 
London florists' establishments described a new 
dwarf Wtiite Ageratum. 'Without much con- 
fidence in the white part of the story, I sent 
for a dozen plants, and received them in fine 
order by mail. They are now in full bloom, 
but the color is blue— no more white than the 
sky is at noon. Had I not had an opportunity 
-of proving the fraud, and copied my correspon- 
dent's description without qualification, some 
of your readers nest season would have had 
good cause to complain of being cheated. The 
great desire for something new, and the avidity 
with which ''novelties" are bought at high 
prices, is a great incentive to thi3 horticultural 
swindling. Every season we import an average 
of two dozen new varieties of flower and per- 
haps half as many of vegetable seeds, and if we 
get one good thing of each we think ourselves 
fortunate; so that our amateur friends will 
understand that they are not alone the suffer- 
ers, and should not complain of our seedsmen 
if they do not indorse the foreign descriptions. 
— i — mmmt M i » 
Experience with the Egg-Plant. 
BT HENRI TV. TOUNG. 
I was interested in an article by Peter Hen- 
derson, in the October Agriculturist, upon the 
Egg-plant, and as I have succeeded in raising 
an abundance of thig delicious vegetable during 
the past season in a rather less expensive way 
than he deems essential, I will, for the informa- 
tion of your readers who have never raised it, 
narrate ray experience. I grew the two varieties, 
Black Pekin and Improved New York Purple, of 
which I made my first sowing in boxes in the 
house late in March, but keeping them in a 
room iu which there was no fire, it was over a 
month before they germinated. My second 
sowing was made in my hot-bed on April 1st, 
and they came up iu eight days. This was 20 
days too early, according to Mr. Henderson's 
•view; and had I kept up a heat of 70° until it 
was safe to transplant them, they must certainly 
have outgrown the bed, which, by the way, had 
muslin covers instead of glass sashes; but the 
heating material being solely fresh horse-manure, 
the heat was soon exhausted, and their growth 
for a long time very slow. I also made a third 
sowing in a cold-frame, similarly covered, on 
April 10th, where they came up in 18 days. 
May 17th, I transplanted several of the Pur- 
ple plants from the hot-bed into the field, but 
their vitality was impaired by the cold, and 
they soon succumbed to the attacks of a small 
black flea, that first appeared about that date. 
I do not recall the name of this flea, but it wa; 
an old acquaintance, that had destroyed im- 
plants on a former attempt to raise them. It 
attacks all the plants of the Solauum Family, 
so far as I know, except peppers. They de- 
stroyed all my tomatoes sown iu the open 
ground, and made sad havoc in my beds, dam- 
aging tomatoes there, and threatening the en- 
tire destruction of petunias and egg-plants, even 
going so far as to riddle the leaves of the wild 
Bittersweet (Solatium Dulcamara), while I have 
seen potato-vines covered with them. To check 
them, I tried dusting with lime and sprinkling 
with solutions of tobacco, guano, etc., which 
were at best but partially successful, as every 
one of the egg-plants in the cold-frame perished, 
and a part in the hot-bed, the remainder suffer- 
ing severely. As they did not attack my plants 
in the house, I am of the opinion that a box 
in a warm room would be the safest and per- 
haps the best place for us to start them. 
June 12th, I transplanted about twenty of 
each variety from the hot-bed into the field, and 
although they seemed very impatient of re- 
moval they all survived. The Black Pekius 
commenced to bloom July 21st, several days 
before the others, and were far ahead in fruiting, 
but not as prolific. 'We have had an abundant 
supply of both through September and October 
thus far, and would have had a large stock on 
hand now had not I been so hasty as to cut 
them up and house my fruit on September 22d, 
in anticipation of the frost winch occurred on 
the next succeeding night, but did not kill, only 
scotched the vines I left. There has not been a 
sign of frost siuce, and I might just as well have 
had the benefit of a whole month's growth, and 
double the quantity of sound fruit on the vines 
at this date, as to have a pile of them nearly all 
decayed iu an out-house. Thus have I learned 
how "haste makes waste." 
Those sown in boxes in the house and kept 
spindling iu the shade in a cold room, I trans- 
planted into the old hot-bed June 12th, and 
from thence into the open ground on July 25th, 
yet they had eggs as large as the largest apples 
by September 20th. Had these plants been 
kept iu a warm room iustead of a cold one, it 
would have made nearly a month's difference 
in their growth, and they might have been as 
early as any ; their exemption from the attacks 
of the flea giving them one great advantage 
over even those grown in the hot-bed. 
From these facts, I conclude that a uniform 
temperature of 70°, although desirable, is not 
absolutely required, or even the most important 
requisite for the egg-plant. 
Roanoke, L. I., October 17th, 1871. 
The "Early Shipping" Tomato. 
BY TETKR HEXDERSOX. 
This is a new and valuable variety, raised by 
Mr. Turner, of Norwich, Ct., and is a hybrid 
between "Keyes' Prolific" and " Crimson Clus- 
ter." It has qualities that will render it ex- 
tremely valuable for Bermuda or our own 
Southern latitudes, as it is as early as the earli- 
est, and enormously productive — haviug from 
twenty to thirty medium-sized fruits in a cluster. 
xVbove all, its solid, seedless character enables 
it to carry in shipping much better than the 
larger sorts. All who have had experience in 
shipping tomatoe3 from points where they re- 
quire to be over a week in transit, know the loss 
often experienced in fruit if too ripe when 
picked, and if not sufficiently ripe there is a 
corresponding loss iu price. But this compara- 
tively small variety, with its thick skin, may be 
picked nearly ripe in New Orleans, Charleston, 
or Savannah in June, and if carefully packed 
be in as good condition on arrival in New York 
or Philadelphia as if grown near those cities. 
Titf. European Larch — Some of our West- 
ern friends are very enthusiastic about the Eu- 
ropean Larch, and claim that it is preferable to 
all other trees for profitable planting. Of the 
excellence of the timber there is no doubt. It 
is uncqualed for durability. The tree seems 
to be a sufficiently rapid grower. Last year the 
writer put out a small one in rather poor soil, 
poorer probably than any one would ever select 
for a plantation. Noticing that it had made a 
remarkable growth, it was measured, and we 
found that during the past season the leader had 
grown four feet, and the branches had a new 
growth of one to two feet. A tree like this will 
make limber rapidly. 
Notes from the Pines. 
Telling One's Experience. — The only way 
in which we can arrive at a proper estimate of 
the value of new things is for each one to say 
how they have done with him. If one reports 
favorably upon a variety he is at once a very 
good fellow; but if his report is adverse, those 
having an interest in the plant, seed, or what- 
ever it may be in question, don't find him to be 
such a very good fellow after all. It takes 
several years to ascertain the precise value of a 
new thing, whether it be fruit, flower, or vege- 
table. For instance, the 
Sheldon Pear was for some years thought 
to be one of the very best, but it has begun to 
crack in widely separated localities, and in 
many places is quite as worthless as the old 
Virgalieu. When I gave my experience with 
Moore's Concord Corn I was aware that I 
should displease some persons. The seed was 
from the best source, the corn had good 
culture, but it was a thorough failure. I re- 
corded that experience with the view of calling 
out that which had been favorable, but while 
those interested iu the corn growl at me, they 
do not take the trouble to tell how it succeeded 
with them. I am quite sure that mine is an ex- 
ceptional case. Such things will sometimes 
occur, as we have an instance in Mr. Quinn's 
experience with the 
Peerless Potato. Mr. Qninn, whose accu- 
racy of observation and disinterestedness of 
judgment no one will question, in an article iu 
the Weekly Tribune, puts the Peerless down as 
of poor quality. Now, with me, it is of as good 
a quality as any potato can be. It yields won- 
derfully, and has fewer small tubers than any 
potato I ever grew. 
The " Late Roses."— I do not refer to " the 
last rose of summer " kind, but to the potatoes 
of this name. It seems that in more thau one 
instance exceptional specimens of the Early 
Rose have shown a tendency to be late, and 
tl>eso have been propagated and are offered as 
new varieties. Thorburu & Co. sent us speci- 
mens of their "Late Rose," fine large potatoes, 
having the general appearance of the Early 
Rose, and it is stated that they are more pro- 
ductive and better keepers. A few days later I 
received specimens, from B. K. Bliss & Son, of 
another "Late Rose," similar in appearance. 
Soon after this I obtained through a friend a 
specimen of a seedling raised by Mr. Geo. W". 
Campbell, of Delaware, Ohio, which he also 
calls the Late Rose. So here we have three 
lots, all claiming to be of different origin, and 
bearing the same name. Iu appearance they 
are as alike as three peas, and all excellent po- 
tatoes. Whatever differences there may be in 
growth and productiveness can of course only 
be told upon trial. But what a misfortune iu 
nomenclature, and what acoufused "war of the 
roses" it will lead to if some distinguishing 
prefix is not given to them ! " That which we 
