1S62.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
867 
Many a person receives liere tlie first germs of a 
taste for rural pursuits. Many a person is sur¬ 
prised to learn of tlie wide variety of trees and 
plants which have been brought into cultiva- 
, lion. It is said that the day seldom passes when 
botanists, or amateurs, or nurserymen may not 
be seen here, examining the trees and making 
notes in their memorandum-books, for use else¬ 
where. As Mr. Downing said, when visiting it, 
in 1850, “ The most perfect novice in trees can 
thus, by walking round the arboretum, obtain 
in a short time much knowledge of the hardy 
Sylva; while the arboriculturist can solve many 
a knotty point, by looking at the trees and 
plants, which no amount of study, without the 
living specimen, would settle.” 
We are happy to know that some of our 
leading nurserymen, in this country, are estab¬ 
lishing arboretums of considerable extent, where 
the purchaser can see trees and shrubs in their 
maturity and perfection. And some of our lit¬ 
erary institutions and country-residences are be¬ 
ing embellished in the same way. A good idea. 
i'or the American Agriculturist. 
Secure the Best Varieties of Apples. 
Farmers and orcliardists who have more ap¬ 
ple trees than is necessary to supply their fami¬ 
lies with an abundance the year round, will do 
well to change the varieties of the surplus trees 
by grafting, to Sweet Bough, Golden Sweet, Jer¬ 
sey Sweet and Tallman Sweet for stock, and to 
none but the very best long keeping varieties 
for market. When there is an abundant crop as 
at present, the Fall and early Winter market is 
seldom remunerative* but long keepers like the 
Northern Spy, Esopus Spitzenberg, Roxbury 
Russet and Baldwin, will always pay if proper¬ 
ly managed and kept for late Spring market, 
especially the Spy and Russet. The Northern 
Spy is a large, handsome, showy apple, of good 
quality, a very long keeper, and retains its fresh¬ 
ness longer and commands a higher price than 
any other apple of its season. It is not generally 
known and appreciated, or it would be more 
generally cultivated both for family use and 
market. Some parties have charged it with 
being a shy bearer, but this is an error, and re¬ 
sults from the fact that being a thrifty, vigorous 
grower while young, it does not come into full 
bearing as early as some varieties which are mod¬ 
erate or slow growers while young. Any man 
who plants an orchard of this variety and trains 
(prunes) and cultivates according to its peculiar 
habits, can make no better investment, and nei¬ 
ther himself nor his posterity will ever regret 
this choice. It is a sound, healthy, long lived 
tree, uniform in size and form, and the hand¬ 
somest tree grown. 
On account of its rigid, compact and uniform¬ 
ly upright habits it may be planted 25 feet 
apart where those of larger growth and spread¬ 
ing habits, like the Swaar, Baldwin and Fall 
Pippin, planted on the same soil, would require 
at least 30 feet distance apart. Furthermore, the 
Spy should be grown in the nursery with very 
low heads, commencing with two to four branch¬ 
es not more than 2k feet from the ground, and 
those branches cut back to one foot, and the 
branches of the next season’s growth to 12 or 15 
inches, and so on, keeping the center open to 
form as broad a head as possible. This mode 
of training will improve the natural upright 
form of the head and also hasten its bearing. 
Another fact which highly recommends the 
Spy is, that it blossoms two weeks later than 
others, which would often save the fruit from 
destruction by late frosts like that of the 
Spring of 1859, and this peculiarity makes this 
adapted to northern localities where Spring 
frosts are late and severe,'as in a portion of 
New-England, Canada, St. Johns, and New- 
Brunswick. Pomologist. 
Business Hints to Nurserymen. 
Let.us say that, in what follows, we are hot so¬ 
liciting advertisements for this or any other 
journal. We can not afford to do much adver¬ 
tising: paper is too costly; postage would be 
doubled if we added a single page more; and, as 
a rule, a page of good reading matter set before 
at least two hundred thousand readers (not all 
subscribers, of course,)' in the end pays better 
than even our high prices for advertisements." 
' First then, we say, that large advertising, ju¬ 
diciously done, by good reliable nurserymen, is 
a paying operation. It costs little more to pro¬ 
vide and sell $13,000 worth of trees and plants 
than it does for $10,000 worth in a year. The 
same organized force of men, the same machine¬ 
ry, etc., is required in one case as in the other. 
As with newspapers, so with nurseries, the cost 
of offices, making out catalogues, and keeping- 
up a working force, is almost as heavy for a 
small business well done, as for a large one, and 
the largest profits are on the last sales. A few 
hundred dollars in advertising will pretty sure¬ 
ly bring the increased trade. 
Second. In making out catalogues, advertise¬ 
ments, hand-bills, etc.,' it is best to be explicit. 
Tell just what is for sale, the kind and character 
of trees and plants, the price of each; what is 
to be charged for packing—in short, answer just 
such questions as are likely to be asked in a per¬ 
sonal conversation. A m'an is much more like¬ 
ly to buy, and to want to buy a thing, if he 
knows just what and how he can buy, than if 
the particulars are left in uncertainty, and he is 
in doubt about the “ extras.” 
Third. The best season for advertising most 
largely is, we think, in Winter. People then 
have time to read, to plan, and select what they 
desire. A man will be much more likely to de¬ 
cide upon setting out an orchard, or ornamental 
trees, while he has leisure to look over the sub¬ 
ject, and calculate the advantages, than when 
spring work i3 beginning to drive him up. Ten 
to one he will then put off tree-planting to a 
more convenient season. Suppose that all the 
trees to be purchased next Spring were selected 
and ordered in January and February, with all 
the preliminary correspondence completed be¬ 
fore April. The purchasers would then be on 
the look out for manure, for the preparation of 
the ground, and be much more likely to make 
the trees live and thrive—to the credit of the 
seller. On the other hand, the nurseryman 
would have his plans all laid, and be able to 
have the trees taken up at the right time, 
packed in good order, and not hurriedly and im¬ 
perfectly; his work would be done more profit¬ 
ably and more satisfactorily all round. As it 
now is, late in the Spring the nurseryman ad- 
* We say high prices, because some think our charges 
high, though in reality $1.50 a line would be cheaper than 
10 cents a line in the average of journals of a similar 
class. The'true method of estimating advertisements is: 
first, the price per line , for each 100 or 1000 readers 
reached; second, the characteiyof the readers; third, the 
smallness of the pages and their moderate limit and num¬ 
ber, and the consequent likelihood of any advertisement 
being seen; and fourth, the select character of the ad¬ 
vertisements. On these points we leave the Agriculturist 
advertising pages to speak for themselves, with the single 
remark that we reject a far larger number of advertise¬ 
ments than we admit. 
vertises, people get up a furore for trees, their 
orders are rushed in, the sellers run short on 
particular sorts, and have not time to correspond 
with those ordering; the arrival of large orders 
at once creates confusion and hurry; trees, are 
hurriedly packed and sent off ; the buyers plant 
them hurriedly without due care, and the re¬ 
sults are—well known. We esteem the honest, 
intelligent nurseryman, who sets forth an at¬ 
tractive display of really good trees, and induces 
people to buy them, as a benefactor to the coun¬ 
try, for there are not a tithe of the fruit and 
ornamental trees in the country that there ought 
to be, for the profit and pleasure of the people 
at large. The past season was’ an ; exception; 
the product of fruit was greater than ever be¬ 
fore, and greater by far than we.can expect as a 
rule; yet, except in a few favored localities, not 
half of the people have been supplied with an 
abundance of good fruit during the present year. 
One hint more. Nurserymen are generally 
too ambitious to get large catalogues, embracing- 
the greatest possible variety of every kind of 
fruit. They must offer two or three hundred 
varieties of apples and pears, and a proportion¬ 
ally large variety of other fruits. It is all very 
well for two or three great central establish¬ 
ments to have and offer about every thing 
grown; but there are in reality only a few kinds 
of the different fruits that are worth buying. If 
we were about starting a nursery in any locality, 
looking to our own profit, and the interests of 
our customers as well, we would carefully as¬ 
certain what were a few of the lest apples, 
pears, peaches, plums, etc., for the localities 
where we looked for trade, and push these into 
the market. To induce a man to purchase an 
assortment of thirty or forty kinds of apples, 
for example, -might tickle his fancy, and our own 
pocket, but it would neither be to his benefit, 
nor to our lasting credit. 
Finally , no man should touch the nursery 
business, unless he have experience and obser¬ 
vation among trees; nor unless he intend to 
make it a permanent business, so that he will 
feel it to be his interest to acquire and, sustain a 
credit for strict honesty. The meanest of all 
cheating is that in which a man palms off a poor 
or untrue fruit tree for the sake of a shilling 
profit, involving the buyer in loss of purchase 
money, loss of time and care, and loss of inter¬ 
est, when after half a dozen or a dozen years 
of expectation, he finds that he has been the 
victim of deception. 
A Common Mistake in Planting. 
One of the greatest and commonest errors in 
tree-planting, is that of setting out large trees 
and many of them, in small inclosures. The ru¬ 
ral improver thinks that he wants a great vari¬ 
ety of trees, such as he has seen on Mr. Smith’s 
place, and at Judge Jones’ great establishment. 
So he adds tree to tree, year after year. While 
they are small, they look pretty, and all goes on 
well. But ere long, they spread out their limbs 
on every side, until they meet and overlap each 
other, making a complete forest jungle. None 
of them can become well-formed trees; they 
grow up spindling, or lop-sided, and give little 
real satisfaction. And besides, what can be ex¬ 
pected of the grass under such overhanging 
boughs and such a mass of tree-roots ? And 
what of shrubs and plants? Where, too, are 
the views of the street, or of the surrounding 
country? Everyway, the practice is a bad one. 
Here let a remedy be suggested: Set out but 
few trees. Plant the largest along the bounda- 
