4S6 THE RURAL HEW-YO RSCER. JULY 20 
shows such masses of flowers that its surface is 
literally covered. Its color is rich, and size 
large. There are indeed larger and more ex¬ 
quisite Clematises, but none blooms better or 
grows more vigorously, or, in a word, is better 
suited for general employment. 
r A PRETTY SPIRAEA. 
The pretty dwarf Spiriea crispifolia, introduc¬ 
ed by Mr. Taos. Hogg, and certainly very novel, 
is just now iii bloom. Its entire surface is cov¬ 
ered with pretty pink flowers that will come a 
second time during the latter part of summer 
and early fall. It looks and aots very like Spiraea 
callosa in many ways. This habit of late bloom¬ 
ing renders it valuable for completing the suc¬ 
cession of bloom at a season when flowers are 
scarce. The landscape gardener will also find 
its round, dwarf form useful in shading off the 
outskirts of a group of shrubs. As it grows 
older, it becomes more spherioal and compact. 
u*- THE GOLDEN YEW, 
so long and justly celebrated, is especially beau¬ 
tiful during June. There is a softness and 
brilliancy about its gold, that is very charming. 
Unlike the Golden lietinospora, this fine color¬ 
ing changes to a greener hue during the ma¬ 
turity of late summer and fall. No tree can be 
trained into artificial shapes more perfectly than 
the Golden Yew. I can recall now a compact 
group of three specimens so pruned that the 
imagination might readily conceive them as re¬ 
presenting the idontioal quadruped that wore 
the Golden Fleece. Aud yet I question whether 
the Goldin Yew is ever more graceful and at¬ 
tractive than when it has been pruned juBt 
enough to simply develop the natural curves of 
its true character. 
SIBERIAN ARBOR-VITA. 
The custom of using Siberian Arbor-Vita's in 
quantities for surrounding the lots in cemeteries 
seems to have fallen into disfavor. People are 
coming generally to recognize the superior at¬ 
tractions of a park-like cemetery. It wou’d be a 
pity, however, to neglect the Siberian Arbor- 
VitiB, for although its shape is somewhat too 
formal and definite for a hedge, yet it is, after 
all, the hardiest and most richly colored Arbor- 
Vitse we have. In groups of three or five about 
the lawn, its effect is pleasing and valuable. The 
peculiar form it assumes does not. combine har¬ 
moniously with most other trees. It should bo 
only used sparingly in mixed groups and then 
always among slow-growing evergreens of slight¬ 
ly similar forms. Samuel Pabsons. 
4 4 * - 
THE BANANA IN CALIFOENIA. 
WM. 0. L. DBEW. 
PROSPECTS OF BANANA CULTURE. 
The Banana, Musa sapientum, has until re¬ 
cently, been looked upon as only possible of 
successful cultivation in full tropical climates, 
but as our knowledge of the capabilities of our 
soil and climate has increased, the possi¬ 
bility of snccessfully growing the Banaua with¬ 
in our borders has been advanced, and a few 
have been bold enough to attempt its cultiva¬ 
tion. These pioneer attempts or rather experi¬ 
ments at Banana culture, have been attended 
with very satisfactory results. 
As yet it has only been shown that the Ba¬ 
naua can be successfully and profitably culti¬ 
vated in Los Augeles and San Diego countfJSs, 
but experiments will probably prove that it 
will thrive in other localities. Not many 
years ago it was the general opinion that the 
cultivation of such tropical fruit as the Lemon, 
Orange and Lime, was only possible in (he same 
favored section. A few years’ trial and exper¬ 
iment, however, have Hhowu that they may be¬ 
come with us quite as common and plentiful as 
other less tropical fruit; for instance, the Apple, 
Peach, Plum,or Pear. They are now grown suc¬ 
cessfully in quite every county from one end of 
the State to the other. As with the Orange, a 
few years’ experiment with the Banaua °will 
probably extend its range of successful growth 
to many other counties. 
THE PRESS AND BANANA CULTURE. 
To show what has been done, I would make a 
few extracts from some of our State papers. 
The San Diego News, August 8th, 1877, says : 
‘ * Mr. Asher sent us on Saturday, a package of 
the Bananas raised on his place, that, we think, 
are very good, so far as we are capable of judg¬ 
ing. The variety is the “ Dwarf Sandwich 
Island,” aud although the fruit is not very large, 
it is delicious, and we are told the yield is good. 
Mr. Asheb is testing this variety, and seems im¬ 
pressed with the idea that it will do well. He 
has a large number of them now fully accli¬ 
mated, aud, before long, sufficient tests will 
have been made. Up to this time, they have 
given the best assurances of successful cultiva¬ 
tion. ’’ 
The same journal in a later issue says :—“ We 
looked in at the Bananas of Mr. Asher, yester¬ 
day, and found thorn doing well. Ilis Cavendish 
variety is fruiting in good style, and we noticed 
among the other sorts, one of the largest we 
have ever seen, but did not get the name of it.” 
The Los Angeles Mirror, Nov., 1877, says:— 
“ Duriug the present week, we saw a Banana 
plant of the variety known as the Chinese 
Dwarf, growing upon the place of Mr. C. E. 
White, which beats anything in the Banana 
line we ever heard of. This plant has one bunch 
containing about 170 nicely formed and rapidly 
developing bananas. The fruit retails in our 
market at five cents each, which would make the 
value of this bunch to he the handBome sum of 
$8 50. All of this variety upon his place prom¬ 
ise the same prolific yield.” I might give many 
other similar extracts, showing that the success¬ 
ful culture of the Banana is no louger a doubt 
in California. 
SORTS, 
Florida Banana. —This variety will, without 
doubt, be the most profitable in California. It 
is known botauioally as Musa Cavendishi. It is 
a native of China, grows five to seven feet high ; 
fruits in ton months, bears considerable cold ; 
indeed, it will staud quite a severe frost, and 
still fruit. The outer leaves, it is stated, may all 
be cut off with frost, but with such warm Buns 
as we have, they will soon send out new leaves 
aud keep on growing. They have no seed and 
are propagated only from suckers. 
Chinese Dwarf Banana. —It has generally 
been considered that the Chinese Dwarf was too 
tender for thiB climate It has been fruited, 
however, during the last season in several in¬ 
stances, and will probably prove a staple variety: 
native of China ; grows three to five feet high ; 
fruit fair to medium Bizo and delicious. 
Sandwich Island, or Panama Banana.— 
This species will hardly be found satisfactory in 
California, as it requires a longer season of 
warm weather than can l e had in any locality in 
this State, unless started uuder cover and pro¬ 
tected in the fall and early winter. It is known 
botanicallv as Musa paradisiaca ; grows from 
seven to twelve feet high ; fruit large, delicious 
and wholesome. 
CULTURE. 
The Banana has a perennial root or bulb, 
about the size of a large, say two to four pound, 
turnip. Having prooured bulbs, or plants rather, 
from one-half to four or five feet high, plant 
them eight to twelve inches deep, and six to 
eight feet apart. It will require two years to 
fruit plants under four feet high, while plants 
over that will generally fruit inside of a year. 
The soil should be rich, warm and deep, as they 
require forcing and will stand plont.y of it; mix 
half-decayed manure thoroughly with the soil, 
iu no case must fresh manure be used, as it will 
burn or kill the bulba. Irrigate and cultivate 
well. As they require plenty of moisture, a good 
soaking should be given them every week or, at 
least, once a fortnight. In one year from plant¬ 
ing, if small plants have been sot out, the sucker 
or bulb first plauted will stand five to six feet 
high, aud will bo surrounded by three or four 
smaller suckers from the root. One of these 
suckers or new plants makes it appearance from 
the root every two to four months. Each stalk 
produces but one bunch of fruit, then it dies 
down or should be cut off near the ground, to 
decay by the root, and furnish fertilizing food 
for the new plants coming on, which continually 
sprout from the old root. By the end of from 
one to two years, according to size of plants set 
out. fruit may be gathered from the parent 
stalk, while from five to six suckers will be 
growing from the root. All of these but three 
should be removed, for more than three grow¬ 
ing at once, we not to be desired. If not re¬ 
moved, in the course of three to four years there 
will be six to twelve plants struggling to out-do 
eacb other aud live. Many of them would fail 
to bear at all, while those that would, could 
hardly perfect fruit ; consequently remove and 
set out somewhere else all but three. 
THE BANANA AS IT IS. 
The Banana, or Musa sapientum, is a near 
relative of the Lily family. They are not trees, 
as so many ask, or as you will frequently see in 
some journal, “Banana Tree.” 
Each stalk bears but once and then dies as does 
the Lily, only the lily stalk dies in one year, 
while the Banana takes two years to attain its 
growth before it dies. In its tropical home, the 
plant attains a greater hight than uuder cultiva¬ 
tion; the stem is round aud straight—light 
yellowish-green in color; the foliage is large 
and spreading, ovate in shape, some four to six 
feet long by fifteen to twenty inches broad; it is 
of very delicate texture and is seldom met with 
perfect, being torn more or less by the wind; it 
has a thiok, strong mid-rib running through the 
center. The foliage Burmounts the stem like a 
crown. When the stalk is from eight to ten 
months old, a tuft of blossoms appears in the 
center of this green, leafy crown, a great brown¬ 
ish-colored bud, which lifts up a covering every 
day or two, displaying ten little Bananas, more 
or less, with a peculiar bloom on each. The 
blossoms are heavy with odor, and while iu 
bloom are the delight of the bees. They are 
followed by a cluster of fruit, eight to ten inches 
in length, which attain their growth and ma¬ 
turity iu from ten to twelve monthB. The clus¬ 
ters, when ripe, weigh from 35 to 80 pounds, 
aud contain from 75 to 150 separate bauanas. 
Such is the plant from which is obtained the 
rich clusters of roseate aud golden fruit so de¬ 
licious to the taste, and known aB the banana. 
It is claimed that half an acre of Bananas in 
the tropics, will support fifty persons, 
El Dorado Co., Cal. 
UtiscfUaitforts 
THE TRUTH ABOUT IT. 
[Under this heading, a number of articles 
have been prepared by able writers. These will 
appear from time to time. Their object is not 
at all to deal with “humbugs”—but with the 
many unconscious errors that creep into the 
methods of daily country routine life.— Eds.] 
CAUSE AND EFFECT. 
L. A. ROBERTS. 
It has been the custom among all nations to 
oredit effects of which the causes were not readily 
perceptible to a supernatural origin, and we find 
that the more ignorant a people were, the more 
permanently had superstition its home among 
them: the less they know of the laws which 
govern the universe, the more ready they were 
to attribute physical changes to some imagin¬ 
ary cause, however distant it might be from 
the right one. 
It is intensely interesting and highly in¬ 
structive to follow the progress of nations and 
see, with the passage of time, the clouds of super¬ 
stition break away before the advance of intelli¬ 
gence. One who has read such works as 
Leckey’s History of Rationalism in Europe, and 
noticed how slowly false ideas and beliefs give 
place to truth, oan soarcely wonder that there is 
yet so much superstition left among us—for 
much there is, deny it as we will. 
Of this much, not a little holds its place 
against intelligence and against reason, being 
the effect of early ednoation which, although it 
may be erroneous, often obtains such an influ¬ 
ence that it is impossible to entirely eradicate 
its effects. How many of you who read this fail 
to experience at least a symptom of a shudder, 
when you first see a new moon over your left 
shoulder, and how many hesitate to oommence 
on a Friday a journey or any undertaking of im¬ 
portance that can be done as conveniently on 
any other day. 
There is an influence, name it what you will, 
that has grown with you from your childhood, 
and although your reason and your education, 
alike prove to you your weakness in being af¬ 
fected by it, still it exists and will so long as you 
live, but probably not to an extent to control 
your actions in any great degree. 
That every effect has a cause is a maxim bo 
self-evident that uneducated people accept it 
without question. But their ideas of the rela¬ 
tion of cause and effect are vague and erroneous 
iu the extreme. The list of “ infallible signs” 
is slowly but constantly growing shorter with ns, 
as some drop out with every generation. Fifty 
years ago the belief that the planets exerted in¬ 
fluence on the earth and its inhabitants was 
rife, and the signs of the Zodiac were Btudied 
with as much confidence in their power and 
authority as were the ten commandments, while 
the weather prognostications, as laid down in 
the almanac, were relied upon as explicitly as 
are those of * 1 Old Probabilities” to-day. 
Among the many signs that were current in 
the rural community where I spent my boyhood, 
a few occur to me as I write. 
“ Kill your hogs iu the waxing of the moon, 
or your pork will shrivel in the pot.” 
“ Timber cut while the moon is growing small¬ 
er, will decay with great rapidity.” 
To spill salt indicated a quarrel. [This must 
be very old. In the picture of the Last Supper, 
Judas appears to have just overturned the salt- 
celler.] 
To sow or plant fennel seed is sure to occasion 
a death in the family. [In order to avoid this 
sad contingency aud still have fennel—profanely 
called meeting seed, from the fact that the 
dried heads were usually carried to church to be 
nibbled—it waB customary to beg roots from 
neighbors: when none oould be had, the seed 
was placed on a stone just before a shower that 
it might be washed off and take root, an easy 
way of circumventing fate,] 
The inner bark of tho Box Elder was valued 
for its medicinal properties. When needed as 
an emotic, it was scraped off by an upward mo¬ 
tion; for a cathartic, by one downward. [We 
once heard a physician, who seemed somewhat 
skeptical, inquire if the experiment had been 
tried of administering it when obtained by scrap¬ 
ing around the stem instead of either np or 
down, aud if so, what was the result.] 
When the head of the household died some 
one was deputed to visit the bee hives, and, after 
rapping on each three times, informed the occu¬ 
pants that they should be taken care of, else 
they would all leave the hives. 
When a new moon appeared, it was said to be 
either a wet or dry moon according as the posi¬ 
tion of its horns approached a horizontal line, 
and the work of the farm was arranged accord¬ 
ingly. 
Certain days in one month were regarded as 
indications of the state of the weather for the 
next month, hut I remember there waB a differ¬ 
ence of opinion as to which were the almanac 
days. 
To break a looking-glass was a bad sign; in¬ 
formation of the death of a friend would surely 
follow. 
I might extend these signs but, doubtless, 
most readers, especially those in the conutry, 
have recollections of those now or formerly cur¬ 
rent in their neighborhoods sufficient to fill a 
full page of the Rural. 
It is curious how one coincidence will, with 
those who believe in sigus, overbalance a score 
of failures—but perhaps not wonderful after all, 
—for it is well known that the manner and mind 
with which we search for a thing, materially af¬ 
fects the finding of it. A lawyer passes over half 
a dozen decisions averse to his case, hastily, but 
reads with the closest attention one that is favor¬ 
able—aud with a theologian, one text in proof 
of the correctness of bis position weighs more 
than a dozen against him. 
The howling of a dog in the night is a sign 
that a death will soon occur. The Pennsylvania 
Dutchman whose faith was fixed on this sign, 
gave an incident in proof of its correctness 
thus: “One night mine old dog Bose ho howls 
all the evening, and he howl like every tings, 
when me and mine frau go to bed and in the night 
Katrine Bhe vake me up and say: *' Hans I not 
sleep pretty much any. Bose he howl so, vat ish 
de matter ?’ And I say, ‘ Sompody vill be 
dead pretty quick already'—and den we go to 
sleep mit ourselves, and de next morning I look 
in mine paper and by jingo dore was a man died 
in Cincinnati.” 
There are, among the multitude of signs, 
some that are entitled to consideration, being 
the result of intelligent observations and having 
their foundation iu natural laws; as when the 
smoke ascends from the chimney in an upright 
column, it is a sign of fair weather, but when it 
soon falls to the ground and when the water in 
the pot quickly flies away in steam, rain may be 
expected. ‘ When it is evening, ye say it will 
be fair weather, for the sky is red; and in the 
morning it will be foul weather to-day, for the 
Bky is red and lowering. 
Observing men in the country, and those who 
sail the seas, acquire a reputation for being 
weather-wiBe. “ Where are you going in your 
Sunday olothes ?” said an old fellow who lived 
iu a town adjoining onrs. “ To church,” was the 
reply. “ On account of this continued drought 
we have appointed to-day on which to meet and 
pray for rain.” “ Praying may be well enough,” 
was the irreverent reply, “ but so long as the 
wind goes round with the sun you won’t get 
rain." That man had observed that while the 
wind was easterly in the morning, southerly at 
noon, and westerly at night, no rain fell, but 
probably never thought what was the reason 
of it, or imagined that it was the result of a 
law. 
T)i£ trutk about it is that the whole physical 
world is governed by laws fixed and invariable ; 
nothing is left to accident or chance. Not a 
cloud is formed ; not a drop of rain falls except 
in harmony with these laws that have existed 
since the beginning, and will continue to exist 
to the end of time. 
The study of the Natural Sciences is all that is 
necesB&ry to banish superstition, and it is not 
necessary for this purpose that the study should 
be very thorough or extended. The merest tyro 
in astronomy knows the reason why the position 
of the horns of the new moon is not always the 
same, and in Pbysioal Geography, that whether 
they he in one position or the other, no rain will 
fall in certain sections during the dry season, 
and that a dry moon would be a misuomer dur¬ 
ing the other part of the year. 
When we are wiser than now we shall study 
nature’s laws more attentively and with greater 
practical results. 
- 4*4 
CAPT. CUTTLE’S ADVICE. 
B. PICKMAN MANN. 
To “make a note of it” is a very good 
piece of advice, but to know how to “make 
a note of it ’’ iB an art which must be acquired 
by experience or instruction. It may not be 
amiss, therefore, to offer a few hiuts which are 
the outcome of years of experieuce in this very 
direction. 
It is startling to realize, in the first place, how 
many ways there are in which a note may bo 
made. We may copy what wo arc interested by, 
or we may refer to the place in which we find it, 
by preparing some sort of index. We may make 
these notes en loose sheets of paper or in a 
book; if wo use loose sheets, they may all be of 
one size or may bo of different sizes ; they may 
be arranged by subjects or alphabetically, 
and the same way of arrangement may be 
adopted for the index to a copy-book or a book 
of references. 
If we arrange our index by subjects we are 
plunged immediately into an infinite world. 
What are the leading divisions of knowledge? 
A classification which has obtained wide recog¬ 
nition divides all knowledge into—1. Philoso¬ 
phy, 2. Theology, 3. Sociology, 4. Philology, 5. 
Natural Science, 6. Useful Arts, 7. Fine Arts, 
8. Literature, 9. History. The naniu classifica¬ 
tion divides the Useful Arts into—(6)1. Medi¬ 
cine, (0)2. Engineering, (6)3. Agriculture, (6)4. 
Domestic Economy, (6)5. Communication and 
