178 
THE STH aWBEREY« 
Fig. 44, on a ridge of earth slightly elevated above 
the common level of the ground. The branches 
of one row entwine themselves among those of the 
other, and among themselves, forming a thick, 
tufted mass as indicated by Fig. 46, which, in or¬ 
namental plantations, should constantly be kept 
clipped, in order to preserve uniformity. 
When first set out, the young trees appear to be 
too far apart, leaving spaces wide enough to ad¬ 
mit small animals; but, in the course of a few 
years, their trunks will increase in thickness, and 
form as complete a barrier as the thorn or holly. 
D. J. B. 
The writer of the following communication 
holds a vigorous pen, and if his position be unten¬ 
able, we should be glad to see him answered. It 
appears from the August No. of Hovey’s Maga¬ 
zine (page 311), that one of his correspondents has 
raised a full crop of fruit, and of a large size, from 
a Hovey’s seedling strawberry, he having placed a 
single plant 210 feet from any other; and he too 
contends, that “ there is no necessity for planting it 
either among, or close by any other variety, to in¬ 
sure a crop.” 
For the American Agriculturist. 
THE STRAWBERRY. 
Astoria , July 17, 1843. 
In numerous articles in your periodical and 
others, I have seen assertions that there were male 
and female strawberry plants; and a May corre¬ 
spondent in Hovey’s Magazine says, li Hovey’s 
seedlings have no males;” and your Cincinnati 
correspondent, Mr. Longworth, expresses nearly 
the same opinion; and he gives drawings of the 
male and female strawberry plant. 
The strawberry is traceable to great antiquity. 
Both Cato and Pliny describe it. The strawberry 
in its sexual parts has one property corresponding 
with the almost entire vegetable kingdom; that is 
to say, to secure fructification, it has the stamens 
and pistils (the male and female parts) on the 
same plant. Now to call any perfect strawberry 
plant a male or female plant , is to assert a fact at 
variance, the writer believes, though no botanist, 
with the habits of all other plants; that is to say, 
there are no intermarriages of plants, changing 
the sexual character of their progeny, and passing 
them from the description of those like the straw¬ 
berry, Icosandria, Polygynia (males and females on 
the same plant), to those like the hemp and palms, 
with male and female on dilferent plants. The 
strawberry produces strawberries of the same or¬ 
der and class with itself. The writer believes, 
that neither you, nor any of your correspondents, 
ever found a wild he strawberry—he has looked for 
one in vam. 
I write this article, not to discuss any ab¬ 
struse botanical question, but only to put, as I be¬ 
lieve, the growers of strawberries on the true 
scent , rather than to see them occupying their 
time with pulling up he strawberries, or with in¬ 
troducing a male plant to every nine females, as 
recommended in your December No., by Mr. Long- 
worth, and approbated by Hovey’s Magazine and 
the Albany Cultivator. Mr. L., in his seraglio 
system—nine female vines to one male—does not 
inform us whether the male plant has any family 
at home. Now the writer believes Providence 
acted wisely when he constituted families, and 
placed them under one roof; he believes Provi¬ 
dence in the strawberry plant carried out the same 
principle, and made the stamens (or males) will! 
their anthers, and the pistils (or females) with 
their stigmas, all in one calix. This position is 
certainly most likely to secure fructification. But 
the gentlemen referred to are pleased to recom¬ 
mend a new way of propagating the strawberry, 
by producing a description of plants all females, 
that they may be fecundated by strangers. Such 
cross may be desirable to produce anew variety in 
the next generation, but not to give, as the writer 
believes, the means of securing a crop. 
The editorial authorities above referred to, are so 
high, that we may expect all the strawberry grow¬ 
ers to set about perverting nature, by getting the 
strawberry to grow on principles unknown to Lin¬ 
naeus or Jussieu. They thought and have said, 
that the strawberry always had twenty stamens 
and many pistils, and never knew that a plant 
would change from its stamen and pistil char¬ 
acter, in one calix, to dicecious, or having the sex¬ 
ual parts on different plants; they supposed per¬ 
fect plants did not cut such capers as sometimes 
to have the male and female in the same calix, 
and then again to keep separate establishments. 
We all agree in one point, that the new varie¬ 
ties of strawberries do not produce good crops. 
Now the writer, with some experience on the 
subject, puts forth this doctrine, believing it will 
be found correct. That the strawberry, whether 
Hovey’s or any other kind (and particularly if they 
are the large kinds, and have been highly cultiva¬ 
ted), approach in their character to the cultivated 
rose, the dahlia, and a numerous class of plants, 
which lose their fructifying parts, and some of 
which double, as it is called ; while in others, the 
sexual parts are at least imperfect, and produce no 
seed. The stamens turn into pistils, and some¬ 
times, both stamens and pistils turn even into 
leaves. Now according to Smith, late president 
of the London Horticultural Society, the stamens 
are essential, and no plant hitherto discovered, af¬ 
ter the most careful research, is destitute of them, 
either on the same flower with the pistils, or a 
separate one of the same species. It therefore re¬ 
sults, that Mr. Longworth’s female strawberry 
plant is not a plant , in a correct botanical sense, 
for it does not belong to the class of plants, with 
their sexual parts on different plants, nor does it 
belong to its own class, for it has not the stamens 
and pistils,which the strawberry always has. Now, 
Mr. L.’s plants are something. Pliny mentions 
apples without kernels. Now apples which have 
no seed are no more apples, than Mr. L.’s plants, 
without a union of the stamens and pistils, were 
strawberries. The plants referred to are monsters. 
Nature is outraged and set at defiance as much as 
she is in the double dahlia, carnation, stock, rose, 
and all the double-flowering trees, though not pre- 
