H. G. Hastings & Co., Seedsmen, Atlanta, Georgia. 
29 
Send Us Special Parcels Post Stamps 
The Parcels Post L-aw goes into effect January 1st. This does not change the old rate of postage on seeds, plants or biilbs, but 
does allow us to send packages up to 11 pounds in weight by mail. 
The Postoffice Department has made a very important ruling, however, just as this catalogue is about to be printed and it is to the 
effect that the Special Parcels Post Stamps must be used in stamping all packages, that the regular postage stamps such as are 
used on letters can not be used after January 1st on packages. 
We receive in the course of a year’s business about $20,000.00 worth of stamps in payment for seeds. These are sent by customers 
when it is not convenient to get Money Orders, which we prefer. We have no objection to your sending us stamps in payment for 
seeds on the smaller orders as we use them in stamping packages of seeds. Now that the Postoffice Department has ruled that 
only the Special Parcels Post Stamps can be used on seeds after January 1st, 1913, we must request that when you make stamp re- 
mittances you purchase and enclose in your order what are known as the “Special Parcels Post Stamps” instead of the ordinary 
postage stamps as in the past. These Special Parqels Post Stamps should be on sale at your postoffice January 1st and after. 
We ask that you send Money Orders whenever convenient, but we will accept Parcels Post Stamps in payinent for Seeds, Plants 
or Bulbs when it is not convenient for you to get Money Orders. 
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
Tells The Truth About Box Seeds 
Early last January, A. D. Newman, R. F. D. No. 1, Coushatta, 
Louisiana, wrote us as follows : 
“Please send me one of your 1912 catalogues of garden seed as I 
want a garden this year. I have not had one since I ordered my 
seed from you. I always put off ordering until it is too late and 
then buy box seeds and the result has been “no garden,” so I have 
decided if I have no garden this year it will n3t be for lack of 
good seed.” 
IVe have had in past years considerable to say in our catalogues 
about the danger of depending on box seeds for garden success 
and in several places in this catalogue we urge you to send in your 
orders early so as to be sure and have the right kind of seed on 
hand to take advantage of favorable seasons for gardening. We 
know exactly how thousands upon thousands of people make 
either total or partial garden failures every si)ring; possibly you 
are one of these and have had exactly the same experience in a 
greater or lesser degree, as shown by Mr. Newman’s letter, which 
we print above. You get this catalogue and look it over and see 
many things that you want in your garden or on your farm this 
year and you say that you will order it after while. The matter is 
forgotten until the first warm spring days come and you are then 
in an awful hurry to “make garden.” You then realize the lateness 
of the season and, fearing you can not send to us and get the 
seeds back in time, you rush up to a store and buy seeds from the 
boxes which are there to be sold by the merchant or druggist on 
commission and from which he makes a profit of 40% and in some 
cases more. 
We have stated time and again that box seeds were much infe- 
rior to the seeds put out by this house; further, that box seeds 
were generally of poorer quality than those put out by Mail Order 
Houses. We have reached the point now where we do not have to 
ask you to take our word for it for the United States Department 
of Agriculture, through its Bureau of Plant Industry has been 
checking up on this box seed business for several years. The result 
of this Investigation is found in Circular 101 of the Bureau of Plant 
Industry of the United States Department of Agriculture and you 
can get a copy of it yourself if you want to get full information 
on this subject. 
We want to call your attention further to the fact that this in- 
vestigation of the Department only takes into consideration the 
question of germinating qualities and does not go into any ques- 
tion as to the trueness to name or difference in the quality of vege- 
tables raised from the cheaper and lower grade commission seeds 
and the better quality obtained on an average from Mail Order 
Houses. 
The Department during the years of 1907, 1908, 1909 and 1910 
purchased 12,454 packets of seed from the boxes in the merchants’ 
stores in varinus parts of the country. Out of these 658 germinated 
less than 10%, arid 407 packets failed to germinate at all. Taking 
all kinds of vegetables that are usually planted and taking the 
HastlngsV Corn Book Free 
The South’s future prosperity is largely dependent on growing grain and forage sufficient for her own needs. 
Properly cultivated in the South corn is a much more profitable crop than cotton. 
Rightly grown com can be produced in almost every Southern State for to % the merchant’s cash price. 
The net profits on your cotton or other cash crop is largely dependent on how little you spend for corn or products of corn in the 
shape of meat, meal, etc. 
Corn at 10 to 20 bushels per acre does not and never can pay for the labor put on it. 
Corn at 60 to 100 bushels per acre pays and pays handsomely. 
Do you want to get in the 100 bushels of corn per acre class? 
We publish a 28-page booklet on corn growing in the South. This is what i« known as Hastings’ Corn Book. It contains the best, 
methods used by practical and successful corn growers in Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, Louisiana and other Southern States. 
It gives plain directions for growing 100 bushels or more of corn per acre. If you follow the plain directions given in this booklet 
you need never buy another bushel of corn from your merchant or grain dealer. You will have corn to sell instead of to buy. It will 
pay you to have this “Corn Book” for there is nothing in these corn-growing methods that can’t be carried out by any reasonably 
intelligent farmer in the South. 
Hastings’ Corn Book is not for sale, but we are always-glad to send a copy of it free to any of our customers on request. If in- 
terested, send for it now. . : 
average of the 4 years the average germination of the seeds bought 
from boxes in the stores was 60%%. The highest average germina- 
tion of any year with the box seeds was 63%%, the lowest 55%%. 
We want to ask you a fair, yet very plain question on this sub- 
ject. Is it any wonder that people who depend on seeds purchased 
from boxes in the stores have more or less “bad luck” in their 
gardens? 
We don’t like to talk on this subject, but it seems necessary at 
times and now that the United States Department of Agriculure 
has made such extensive tests, it is time that our people realize 
just what they are buying when they go up to the store every 
spring and place their dependence on “box seeds” for garden 
success. 
This circular of the Department mentions no seedsmen’s names. 
We have no special box seed firm in view when we have said and 
are saying that the seeds sent out in boxes are inferior to those 
sent out by us. That system of selling seed in baxes is dead wrong. 
Practically every seed in every box is one or more years old be- 
fore it is placed on sale with the merchant and necessarily so. 
Practically every packet of seed in those boxes is put up the sum- 
mer or fall, before the new crop seed is ready. The advertised 
“freshness” and “new crop” is usually confined to the fancy colored 
lithographed packets. 
Every time we go out among farmers in the country and talk to 
them about their gardens we hear them talk about having “good 
luck” or “bad luck” as the case may be, in getting the seeds to 
come up. No one knows better than ourselves the great effect that 
weather and soil conditions have on seed germination, but we also 
know that in nine cases out of ten, pour garden luck in germina- 
tion, when the weather is anywhere nearly right and the soil has 
been well prepared, is due to seed of inferior quality. 
The garden, when rightly made, goes a long ways towards the 
family living. When there are plenty of good vegetables ready in 
the garden the store bill is a great deal smaller and usually the 
health of the family is a great deal better. 
Is it right, is it sensible then for you to risk the success of your 
garden for the season by buying and planting “box seeds”? 
We know that it is a little more trouble for you to send your 
order for garden seeds to us than to buy them tip at your store. 
You have the extra trouble of sitting down and writing out the list 
of what you want, the cost of a postage stamp to send the letter. 
On orders to the amount of $1.00 or over we allow you to deduct 
the cost of the Money Order from the amount you send us. 
Now. for a fact isn’t it a great deal better for you to send to 
Hastings whose I’eputation for high quality seed is beyond ques- 
tion than to take “box seed” chances with your garden in the light 
of this Department of Agriculture Bulletin or Circular. It’s cer- 
tainly worth the little extra trouble to send to Hastings and you 
certainly get extra packets of seeds from Hastings that you never 
get from the merchant with the box seeds. 
