60 
THE SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
trespass too much upon your time and patience- 
Shall 1 pass it over, or shall I not 1 
[Here Mr. Afheck introduced specimens of 
various plants, upon which he illustrated the ex- 
periments to which he alluded in his address. 
We also had sent us the Western Farmer and 
Gardeners’ Almanac, for 1842-, with the request 
to make an extract irom it, on budding, grafting, 
&c., but as we have not the necessary plates, 
we are obliged to leave them out. — Eds.] 
To return to the subject of the leal-bud. 
Where there are no leaf-buds, there is no addi- 
tion made to the wood of the plant ; its stem and 
branches will not increase in diameter — hence 
it is most injurious to trim up the stem of a 
young tree, a fruit tree, say — tor, as the destruc- 
tion ot the leaf-buds is accompanied by the ab- 
sence of wood, the tree cannot thrive as it would 
otherwise. There are, in addition t® the regu- 
lar leaf-buds, that are called adventitious, or 
those produced by particular circumstances. 
They may be generated by sap in a state of 
great accumulation and activity, produced by 
abundance of nourishment — by a healthy, vigo- 
rous plant being cut down, and so on. When 
this excessive vigor is produced in a plant,, it is 
favorable to the production of leaf, in preference 
to blossom-buds. This would lead me to the 
subject ol pruning again, and particularly grape 
vines, but I must pass it over for the present. 
The leaf-bud and the flower-bud are supposed to 
be the same in the earliest stage ot their organ- 
ization; but soon after, the change takes place. 
Excessive vigor is favorable to the production 
of leaf-buds, and consequently of wood. On 
the contrary, when rapid and vigorous vegeta- 
tion is checked, blossom-buds and consequently 
fruit will be in abundance ; thus, fruit is .seldom 
borne on the thick vigorous shoots of the peach 
and other fruits, but generally on the slenderand 
less vigorous ones. If an unproductive tree is 
transplanted, it often becomes productive from 
the check given. — {See Note B.) 
Leaves are, as it were, the lungs of the plant. 
They elaborate the sap which has been collect- 
ed by the spongioles of the roots, and conveyed 
to them, the leaves, by the alburnum or sap- 
wood, converting it into the secretions peculiat 
to the species; their structure enabling them to 
expose the sap, for this purpose, to the action of 
tiie atmosphere. Scattered over the surface of 
the leaf are numerous apertures or celfs, called 
stomata, which have the power of opening or 
closing as the circumstances may require. 
And as it is by their means that the preparation 
of the necessary secretions go on, -and being of 
such vital importance to the plant, it is abso- 
lutely necessary to the health of the pla it, that 
they be not choked up with dust or dirt, or inju- 
red by insects, or otherwise destroyedor remov- 
ed. The cleaner the leaves of a plant are kept, 
and the more they are exposed to a moderate 
degree of light and air, the more the plant will 
flourish. We thus find the leaf to be a beauti- 
ful contrivance for exposing a large surface of 
crude sap to the influence of the external air 
and solar light, by the operation of which it is 
rendered capable of being converted into the dif- 
ferent substances required for the growth of the 
plant, and the production of its fruit and seed. 
The flower is that part of the plant destined 
to form and perfect the seed. It has two prin- 
cipal parts, the calyx or outward envelope, and 
the petals forming the corolla. In this specimen 
the petals are colored, and give beauty to the 
flower; but in some plants the reverse is the 
case — the calyx is colored, as in the Fuschias. 
Here are the stamens — here the pistil. The 
stamens bear on their summits an organ, called 
thea?if/i:r, which contains a powder called poi- 
len. When the anther is full grown, it opens 
and ejects the pollen, either dispersing it in the 
air from the elasticity with which it opens, and 
by which it reaches the summit of the pistil; or 
at once depositing it there, or exposing it to the 
action of the wind, or to insects, carry it to its 
proper destination. The pollen consists of ex- 
ceedingly minute hollow balls, or cases, con- 
taining myriads ot particles called granules. 
which are the fertilizing principle of the stam- 
ens. These are light, and being only liberated 
from the anther during very dry weather, are 
scattered by the wind and insects to a great dis- 
tance. Hence the necessity, of which I before 
spoke, for keeping plants, that are left to pro- 
duce seeds, as far apart as possible from each 
other, where of the same species. In double 
flowers, the stamens are transformed into petals ; 
or the petals and the sepals, or leaves forming 
the calyx, are multiplied — hence, few double 
flowers produce many or perfect seeds. The 
pistils have at their base small cells or cavities 
— in the ripe state called seed sepals — in which 
bodies called ovula are placed. These ovula 
are the rudiments of seeds, and are vivified by 
the pollen conveyed to them through the pistil. 
In wild plants, the stigma or secreting surface 
of the pistil, is usually acted upon only by the 
pollen of the stamens which belong to it' In 
this case, the seeds thus vivified, will, when 
sown, produce new individuals differing very 
little from that by which they themselves were 
produced. Therefore, wild plants multiply fro u 
generation to generation without change. But 
gardeners use artificial means to cause devia- 
tions from this law ;. they take the pollen of one 
species, and with it impregnate another species, 
bv which they seek to produce seeds that will 
originate an individual possessing properties 
common to both parents. {See Note A.) These 
are called hybrids, and were at one time, rea- 
soning from analogy, supposed to be sterile ; 
but experience proves that hybrids will produce 
perfect seeds. These seeds, however, are of 
course not to be relied upon to perpetuate the 
particular variety that produced them ; this 
must be done by cuttings, buds and grafts. The’ 
fruit, in the plant before us, is represented by 
the cotton boll. The outer rind here takes the 
place of the edible flesh of the apple, the pulp of 
the peach and so on — being a provision of na- 
ture for the protection of the seed. The fruit, 
strictly speaking, is the pistil arrived at matu- 
rity. When the calyx adheres to the pistil, and 
forms a part of the fruit, as is the case with the 
apple, pomegranate, &c., that fruit is called in- 
ferior. But when the pistil alone ripens, the 
calyx not adhering to it, as is the case here, and 
in the peach, the fruit is called superior. A 
superior fruit consisting ot only one, or of a ve- 
ry small number of transformed leaves, it has 
not, like the branches, the power of communi- 
cating with the earth, and of feeding itself, and 
eLborating or preparing its own food, but must 
depend upon the leaves on ^the young ■ shoots 
above it— as we see here, and in the peach : 
but inferior fruit, having the calyx leaves at its 
termination, has a more powerful communica- 
tion with the branch, is enabled to attract its 
own secretions or food more readily, and does 
not require the assistance of leaves above it. 
These facts require to be borne in mind in pru- 
ning ; but, as the remarks 1 before made on this 
subject will apply here, I will not repeat them. 
And now, having followed the plant through 
its entire course ot existence, from its first ap- 
pearance from the seed, until the seed is again 
produced, 1 will come to a close — assuring you 
that I feel grateful for the attention you have 
given me, and the patience with which all have 
heard me through a lecture that must have been 
somewhat dry to many. It has assisted mein 
what would otherwise have been quite a task — 
my first public lecture. 
Notes. — (A.)— Dr. Lovelace, of Wilkinson 
county, submitted to the appropriate committee, 
at the fair, a specimen of cotton, which I pre- 
sume to be a hybrid, that certainly, in its ex- 
treme fineness and length of staple, and in its 
aroductiveness, promises to reward Dr. L. for 
lis enterprise. The variety seems to be alrea- 
dy tolerably well established, but I have no 
doubt yet sports much; and will require some 
years of careful cultivation apart from any oth- 
er variety, and selection of seed, to ensure a dis- 
tinct variety. Dr. L. deserves the thanks of the 
society, which have been awarded him. He 
has mine, sincerely, for the few seeds in my pos- 
session, which 1 shall endeavor to increase. 
(B.) — Although this has long been proven an 
established fact— that the curtailment of the 
roots, or by some other means giving the plant 
a check in its growth, will cause the production 
of fruit-buds and fruit, it has but recently been 
included by gardeners as a part of their regular 
practice. The Pear is well known to be long 
in producing its fruit, particularly seedlings, or 
grafts upon free stocks, or tall-growing stocks. 
By laying bare the roots of a tree, which con- 
tinues year after year, to grow vigorously, but 
produces no fruit, and pruning away the largest 
lateral roots, it will be thrown into bearing al- 
most immediately— at all events, after the lapse 
of a season. 
From the Central New York Farmer. 
THE EFFECTS OF AGRICULTURAL PAPERS IL- 
LUSTRATED, 
OR THE STORY OF UNCLE TIM AND HIS SON. 
Mr. Timothy Treadmill, was about the tight- 
est man that ever came from “down east,” but 
although penurious in the last degree, he never 
became very rich. He was a firm believer in 
the doctrine of “ following in the footsteps of 
his predecessors,” and practiced it to an iota. 
The way his father planted corn, he planted it; 
the same time in the moon that his father sow- 
ed peas, he sowed them. The last pair of cart 
wheels that were seen wearing a streak tire, 
were Uncle Tim’s— and the last of the old wood- 
en plows was seen mouldering into its original 
elements at the back side of his wood-house. 
In short, ‘ with the exception of adopting some 
few improvements in the way of implements, he 
was precisely as good a farmer the day he left 
his father’s roof, as he was forty years after- 
wards. 
That there was any better way of farming 
than that practiced by his father and all the rest 
of the good people down in old Connecticut, for 
so long a time, nothing short of actual demon- 
stration could make him believe. The idea of 
improvement in farming, seemed to be as ab- 
surd in his mind, as that the bees should set 
aoout making an improvement in the construc- 
tion of their cells, or the birds in building their 
nests. Book farming and neve notions were his 
utter abomination. What! such men as Judge 
Buel, who never pretende I to be a farmer till he 
was forty years old, undertake to teach him how 
to raise corn and potatoes, who had been a far- 
mer all his days, and his father before him. He 
taiic a newspaper Ka lesim ho .V to No — 
he knew better than to pay his money for such 
foolery as that. If any body wanted to read the 
big stories of them new [angled farmers about 
Albany, about their great crops and their new 
fashioned kinds of cattle and hogs, he was will- 
ing they should: but, for his part, he believed 
he could farm about as well as those that print- 
ed newspapers, and raised spotted hogs to 
sell. 
His farm was “ suitably divided into mow- 
ing, pasturing, tillage and wood-land.” What 
was in pasture when he bought the farm, re- 
mained in pasture still, and what was “ mow- 
ing” at that time, the plowshare had never dis- 
turbed, and what was plowland then, remained 
still the same. His manure always laid at the 
barn till fall, because it was so much better for 
corn after it was nicely rotted ; and his barn- 
yard was so situated that the water would run 
from it in all directions — of course it was al- 
ways nice and dry. Wiien he happened to 
have a little manure left after planting, he has 
been known to put a little sprinkling on some 
spot in his meadow, where he thought the dai- 
sies and June grass were likely to run out ; but 
as long as the daisies flourished well, he was 
not alarmed, for he said the farmers down in 
Conn., thought they made about the best hay of 
any thing. In hoeing, he was not over-anxious 
about the weeds, for he said they kept the 
ground light and moist, and that where the 
quack grass was thickest, he always had the 
best corn. But as Uncle Tim was not deeply 
