20 
AMERICAN AGrRICU LTUEIST. 
LJanuakt, 
6tems from one seed. Plants were 
not uncommon, exhibiting fifteen 
or twenty stalks, and sometimes as 
many as twenty-four were thrown up. 
If cut when three or four feet high, 
for feeding green, it might be cut sev¬ 
eral times in one season. The stalks 
were not large when standing rather 
thickly, bm quite tender and sweet, 
even when dry. It was exceedingly 
leafly and succulent when green, and 
was greedily devoured by cattle. Cut 
when the heads appeared, and dried 
as hay, or com, it made sweet palata¬ 
ble hay, and was much more easily 
cured than corn-fodder. The largest 
actual yield reported was over nine 
and a half tons of dry fodder, per acre. 
This crop was left until after severe 
frost, in the vain hope of securing 
ripened seed, and the amount of fod¬ 
der had been materially diminished, so 
that the estimate made then, that, had 
it been cut before frost, not less thau 
twelve tons would have been harvest¬ 
ed, is not improbable. The seed was 
sometimes obtained clean and some¬ 
times in the chaff, each seed being sur¬ 
rounded by a sort of bristly envelope. 
The naked seed is somewhat top¬ 
shaped, and very small, of about the 
color of Timothy seed. It was sown 
in rows or drills, twenty inches to two 
feet apart, about ten seeds to the foot. 
It made very slow growth, and seem¬ 
ed unpromising at first, but when the 
weather became hot, the main stem 
and tillers shot up very rapidly, un¬ 
til it stood eight to ten feet high, and 
astonished every one by the immense 
amount of fodder which a piece of 
land would produce.” In view of the 
general interest now taken in the Mil¬ 
lets, Hurra, Guinea grass, and similar 
fodder crops, we give this, as we have 
given others, with the best informa¬ 
tion we can obtain concerning them. 
Fodder crops of various kinds, in this 
country, come in competition with In¬ 
dian Corn, which, though an excellent 
fodder plant, is not so perfect that our 
farmers are not warranted in assuming 
that there can be none better. Should 
this come into favor, our dealers can readily have 
the seed grown for them in the Southern States. 
A New Double White Violet, “ Belle de 
Chatenay ” 
It is probable that no one, in looking at the flower 
of the new double violet, Belle de Chatenay, it¬ 
self, or its engraved representation, apart from the 
DOUBLE WHITE VIOLET, “ BELLE DE CHATENAY. 
leaves, would recognize it, at first sight, to be that 
of a violet. The flower of the single violet is char¬ 
acteristically and regularly irregular, while in this 
double variety all semblance to the usual structure 
Egyptian on “pearl” millet.— {PeniciHaria spicata, 
of the violet is lost, and we have in place of the 
normal flower a mass of petals heaped up upon one 
another to make a “full double.” This novelty 
was introduced by M. L. Paillet, of Paris, the past 
summer. The attempts of the French nurserymen 
and florists to give us their catalogues and descrip¬ 
tions in English are sometimes very 
amusing, and, though M. Paillet suc¬ 
ceeds better than some of his country¬ 
men, his description is of the French— 
Frencliy. He says : “ This 
new Viola is sent out for 
the first time by me the 
present season, and is 
the beautyfullest variety 
known. The flower is 
very large, about one inch 
and third in diameter, 
very double petals, very 
well set in order like a 
double camellia flower, 
pure white and the border 
of petals embroidered 
with red purple lilac. This 
variety is very hardy and 
will be a precious plant 
for forcing or market pur¬ 
poses. Variety extra.” 
After all this description, 
the concluding “variety 
extra ” seems as much an 
anti-climax as Mr. Paillet’s countryman’s com¬ 
ments on a sunrise at sea, when he exclaimed: 
“Voila! tres grande! tres magnifique ! very 
good ! ! ” Still, in spite of the producer’s enthusi¬ 
asm, we incline to the belief that the 
plant will warrant it. We have re¬ 
ceived a specimen from the greenhouse 
establishment of Henry A. Dreer—an 
establishment in which, by the way, a 
worthy son sustains the reputation of 
our lamented friend, his father, in 
quietly introducing choice novelties. 
Aside from the growers who supply 
the demand of cities—and it is a large 
one—for violet flowers, the choice va¬ 
rieties of the European fragrant Violet 
(Viola odorata) are not much grown. 
Beyond a clump of the common single 
form in a shady place, to give its sweet¬ 
est of all flowers in early spring, we 
see but little attention given to the 
violet in private gardens. With but 
little trouble, one may have violets 
from January until in May they bloom 
in the open ground. Plants, obtained 
by setting out runners in spring in rich 
6oil, and giving all the water they need 
in dry weather, may be set in early 
autumn in a common cold frame. 
Allow them to grow until winter comes, 
then fill up with leaves, put on the 
sash, and a shutter over that. When 
flowers are wanted, remove the sash, 
and take off the leaves, and if the 
plants were strong, and well furnished 
with buds, they will begin to bloom in 
a week or two. Of course, the plants 
must be treated like others under glass, 
and have abundant air on mild days, 
and water as needed. A frame of three 
sashes, with boards to separate it into 
three parts, may be uncovered, one 
sash at a time, at intervals of two or 
three weeks, and thus keep up a suc¬ 
cession of these most charmingly fra¬ 
grant and universally popular flowers. 
The Onion Maggot.— A correspond¬ 
ent of the “Journal of Horticulture ” 
(London) advises the use of hot water, 
“a little off the boil” to destroy the 
onion maggot. This he says, if taken 
in time, is effective, but if the maggots 
are not attended to before they have 
eaten their way into the substance of 
young onions, and are thus beyond 
reach, neither this nor any other ap¬ 
plication will be of use. When we last spring 
mentioned the use of hot water to kill the cab¬ 
bage worm, and advised its trial, we received a 
letter of protest from a Canada correspondent. 
This gentleman, who thought our publication 
showed a lack of the proper knowledge of the re¬ 
the thick-leaved elm. —{Seepage 22.) 
lations of heat to plant life, may now turn his at* 
tention to the mother country, where they are 
so lacking in “ common sense ” as to use this very 
old method of killing several kinds of insects. 
