8o6 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
November 21 
NOTES FROM THE RURAL GROUNDS 
OuK Splendid Native Rhododen- 
DKOXS. —A century ago there was great 
interest abroad in American plants, and 
our beautiful rose bay, Rhododendron 
Catawbienise, was freely exported to be 
used in hybridizing the tender Asiatic 
species. Many attractive varieties 
were bred that have 'since been com¬ 
ing back to us in quantity, but few have 
proved able to endure our Winters, and 
none is really as handsome as the parent 
species. The range of color has been 
greatly extended by crossing with the 
oriental kinds; there are some fine 
bright rose and crimson shades, but 
many of the colors are muddy and all 
lack the exquisite freshnoss so notice¬ 
able in our wild kinds. After much 
costly experience with imported plants 
admirers of these beautiful fiow'ering 
evergreens are turning to the reliably 
hardy native species and planting them 
in unprecedented numbers. Collected 
clumps of the hardy and strong-growing 
R. maximum are now supplied by the 
carload from the mountains of Penn¬ 
sylvania and North Carolina. A carload 
costs from $90 to $120, exclusive of 
freight, and is usually made up of mixed 
sizes from two to eight feet high. Large 
clumps may have 20 to 40 stems, well 
furnished with flower buds, and make an 
immediate show when carefully planted. 
Thirty carloads have been furnished for 
a single planting on one estate, thus cre¬ 
ating at once an imposing evergreen 
thicket where none had previously ex¬ 
isted. Imported plants of named varie¬ 
ties are usually confined to single graft¬ 
ed stems, and have the objection, in ad¬ 
dition to doubtful hardiness, of present¬ 
ing a bare appearance near the ground 
until the branches grow heavy enough 
to droop. 
A Native Rhododendron Nursery.— 
Much of renewed interest in Rhododen¬ 
drons and allied flowering evergreens 
may be credited to such nurserymen as 
Harlan P. Kelsey, Boiston, Mass., who has 
long been advocating the use of reliable 
native species in preference to cross¬ 
bred varieties of tender parentage. Mr. 
Kelsey is an extenisive collector of hardy 
plants and shrubs, and in addition has 
a large nursery at Kawana, N. C., at an 
elevation of 3,800 feet, for the propaga¬ 
tion of the rarer species. 
The cut on page 803, Fig. 302, of typi¬ 
cal Catawbienise blooms, is from his 
beautiful new Rhododendron catalogue. 
This species is naturally confined to the 
higher ranges of the southern Allegheny 
and Blue Ridge mountains, and is hardy 
throughout New England. It is compact 
in growth, with very deep green foliage, 
and blooms most freely. The color is a 
clear and bright red-purple. As seen in 
the garden or growing wild it is always 
interesting and attractive. R. maximum 
is the largest species, abundant through¬ 
out the northern Alleghenies, and is oc¬ 
casionally found almost to the Canada 
line. It iis the hardiest and most com¬ 
mon species, probably reaching its per¬ 
fection on the highest ranges of the 
Carolina mountains. The great trusses 
of bloom are in color clear rose-pink or 
waxy white. It blooms in July, and is 
always a strikingly beautiful plant. R. 
punctatum is a southern species natur¬ 
ally quite rare. It has a spreading habit, 
growing about six feet high. The foli- 
jjge is rather narrow, and the clear pink 
blossoms are borne very profusely in 
Jone. It seemis to bear bright sunlight 
better than the other kinds. 
The Mountain Laurel. —All our 
broad-leaved evergreens are locally 
called laurels, but the name is used most 
widely for the beautiful Kalmia lati- 
folia, the mountain laurel of the Eastern 
States. It is common in woodlands from 
Nova Scotia to Florida, and as far west 
as Tennessee. On the southern moun¬ 
tains it becomes almost a small tree, but 
Is usually seen as a dense, broad shrub 
with many yellowish branches clothed 
with glossy evergreen foliage. When in 
blocm in late May or June it is not sur¬ 
passed in beauty by any native shrub. 
The flowers are borne in such masses 
as almost to cover the plant, and are 
formed with the most perfect symmetry. 
The mountain laurel grows in astonish¬ 
ing profusion on the slopes of the Alle¬ 
gheny Mountains, forming thickets miles 
in extent, covering with its singular 
beauty vast tracts of former woodland 
denuded by lumbermen and miners that 
otherwise would be a veritable Gehenna 
of desolation. It makes an attractive 
dooryard shrub, and may be readily 
forced under glass into early bloom. 
There are several species of Kalmia, 
differing slightly from the common type. 
The narrow-leaved K. anguistifolia is 
popularly known as sheep laurel or 
lambkill, as the leaves are supposed to 
be poisonous to sheep and cattle. One 
species, K. polifolia, growis as far north 
as Newfoundland, and is also found in 
the Rocky Mountains. These species dif¬ 
fer horticulturally mainly in size. All 
have white, pink or crimson flowers. 
Kalmiais are less particular as to soil 
than Rhododendrons, and succeed under 
ordinary conditions if carefully trans¬ 
planted in the Spring. Their reputation 
for poisonous foliage is the only objec¬ 
tion to their free use, and this is proba¬ 
bly worse than the reality. Kalmia 
clumps are also marketed in carload lots 
for wild decorative plantings. 
Untimely Blooms. —Apple, pear and 
plum blossoms in November do not 
promise well for full crop next year, 
but they are of frequent occurrence this 
season. Many apple and pear trees are 
quite covered with blooms while carry¬ 
ing at the same time many ripe fruits. 
Kieffer and Le Conte are the pears most 
prominently affected. Apple blossoms 
do not appear to be confined to particu¬ 
lar varieties, but are far more numerous 
on those portions of the trees stripped 
by the September gales. Plum and cher¬ 
ry blooms are borne in a .scattering man¬ 
ner, a few buds popping every day, and 
not in clusters as in the pome fruits. 
There is much diversity of opinion as 
to the cause of this unseasonable bloom¬ 
ing, but the premature defoliation of 
the trees by storms is credited as being 
the chief exciting cause. The result can 
only be lessened vigor and reduced num¬ 
bers of blooms next year. Kieffer pears 
have made a most unsatisfactory show¬ 
ing this year. The crop is small and 
poor, while thousands of trees lost much 
of their foliage in August from fungus 
attacks. 
Belated Roses. —On November 6 we 
found good blooms on 17 varieties of 
outdoor roses, including such sensitive 
kinds as Perle des Jardinis, and on many 
seedlings of the Rambler class. Hybrid 
Perpetual^ have bloomed constantly 
since July, but most of the flowers were 
not highly developed. Climbing Cloth- 
ilde Soupert has been fairly free, but is 
not as constant a bloomer as the dwarf 
form. A plant allowed free growth 
makes canes nearly 10 feet long, but has 
few blossoms after June, while its com¬ 
panion, clipped to two feet, has con¬ 
stantly produced flowers. The free ram¬ 
bling habit has never been conducive to 
continuous blooming in rose plants. 
w. v. F. 
I regret to drop a discordant note Into 
the unbroken “song of praise” we have 
listened to in regard to the October Purple 
plum, but feel compelled to do so, as 
with me I think it rots the worst of 
any Japan I have had experience with. 
I bought It early and top-worked three 
Willards to it the same Spring, which 
grew tremendously and have borne abund¬ 
antly of large, handsome and good fruit 
when it did not rot, but with the exception 
of the 1902 crop, which was almost en¬ 
tirely free from it, I have lost the greater 
part of all that have ever grown from that 
cause. It seems to be differently affected 
from any other that I have noticed, the 
first indication of any trouble being a de¬ 
pression of rather small area, the bottom 
of which seems hard and dry, rather more 
darkly colored and more thickly covered 
with bloom than the surrounding surface, 
from which the affection rather slowly 
spreads, but fast enough so that one’s 
hope for a crop and his plums are both 
soon on the ground. c. n. m. 
Plymouth Co., Mass. 
ARE YOUR KIDNEYS WEAK? 
Thousands of Women Have Kidney 
Trouble and Never Suspect It. 
An interesting letter to our readers 
fiom Mrs. Gertrude Warner Scott, of 
Vinton, Iowa, 
Vinton. Iowa, July 15th, 1902. 
In the summer of 1893 I was taken vio¬ 
lently Ill. My trouble began with pain in 
my stomach, so severe that It seemed as 
if knives were cutting me. I was treated 
by two of the best physicians in the 
county, and consulted another. None of 
them suspected that the cause of my trouble 
was kidney disease. They all told me that 
I had cancer of the stomach, and would 
die. I grew so weak that I could not walk 
any more than a child a month old, and 
I only weighed sixty pounds. One day my 
brother saw in a paper an advertisement 
of Dr. Kilmer’s Swamp-Root, the great 
kidney, liver and bladder remedy. He 
bought me a bottle at our drug store and 
I took it. My family could see a change 
in me, for the better, so they obtained 
more, and I continued the use of Swamp- 
Root regularly. I was so weak and run 
down that it took considerable to build 
me up again. I am now well, thanks to 
Dr. Kilmer’s Swamp-Root, and weigh 148 
pounds, and am keeping house for my 
husband and brother on a farm. Swamp- 
Root cured me after the doctors had 
failed to do me a particle of good. 
The mild and prompt effect of Dr. 
Kilmer’s Swamp-Root, the great kid¬ 
ney, liver and bladder remedy, is soon 
realized. It stands the highest for its 
wonderful cures of the most distressing 
cases. Recommended and taken by 
physicians, used in hospitals and en¬ 
dorsed by people of prominence every¬ 
where. To prove what Swamp-Root will 
do for you, a sample bottle will be sent 
absolutely free, by mail, also a book tell¬ 
ing all about Swamp-Root and its won¬ 
derful cures. Address Dr. Kilmer & Co., 
Binghamton, N. Y., and be sure to men¬ 
tion reading this generous offer in New 
York Rural New-Yorker. 
If you are already convinced that 
Swamp-Root is what you need, you can 
purchase the regular fifty-cent and one- 
dollar size bottles at the drug stores 
everywhere. Don’t make any mistake, 
but remember the name, Swamp-Root, 
Dr. Kilmer’s Swamp-Root, and the ad¬ 
dress, Binghamton, N. Y., on every bot- 
Ue. 
?alnli;\Uer 
PEIRRV DA.VIS’ 
CURES 
COUGHS 
SORETHROAT 
A Wagon’s Worth 
depends uponits convenience and ( 
life. The life depends upon the j 
wheel. You get every conveni-( 
L ence of the Modern Low Handy) 
[ Wagon and double its life by using ^ 
LEGTRIG 
Metal Wheels 
For a few dollars you tumyour 
old running gears or one you can 
buy for a song, into a new wagon. Straight or stag¬ 
gered oval steel spokes. The stoutest wheel you can 
buy. Any height, lit any wagon. No repairs, no rut¬ 
ting, light draft, long service. Let us send you free 
catalog to show you how it saves you money. 
Electric Wheel Company., Box 88, Quincy, 111 
TRY IT’W'BUY IT 
W« believe we h,ave the beat 
farm grinder made and are 
willing to let you prove It. 
niling to let you prove It. 
DITTO’S 
Triple Geared Ball Bearing 
FEED GRINDER 
U it is not the laigestcapa. 
easiest rn&ner, don’t keep iL 
DITTO. Box 56 JoHct.Tll. 
WeWantYou 
to Try Us 
To send us a trial order and test our ability to 
satisfy you in every particular. We have special 
catalogues on almost every line you can think 
of. Tell us what kind of goods you are interested 
in, and we will send you, absolutely free, any of 
the following illustrated catalogues auoting 
wholesale prices. Be sure to mention the one 
you want, and we will send it Free of Charge. 
Furniture Stationery 
Farm Implements Toys 
Vehicles 
Sewing Machines 
Hardware 
Crockery 
Glassware 
Stoves 
Sporting Goods 
Harness 
Blacksmith Tools 
Dairy Goods 
Telephones 
Electrical Goods 
House Paints 
Watches 
Drugs 
Musical Instruments 
Silverware 
Carpets and Rugs 
Underwear 
Groceries 
Bicycles 
Baby Carriages 
Dry Goods 
Photographic Goods 
Notions 
Books 
Shoes 33 Years 
Millinery in the Same 
Cloaks Business 
Furs 
Men’s and Boys’ Suits (both Ready-Made 
and Made-to-Order) including Samples. 
If you desire our complete catalogue, a book 
of over 1100 pages, and weighing 314 pounds, 
send for Catalogue No. 72,and enclose 15 cents 
in either stamps or coin. The small catalogues 
are free. Buy your goods at wholesale prices. 
MONTGOMERY WARD £yCO. 
Michigan Avenue, Madison & Washington Streets 
- « CHICAGO ■ - — 
EBER JR. 
Gasoline Engines 
are the outgrowth of 19 years of 
engine building. Notapproached 
for strength, safetj. Bimplicltj or width 
of duty. Valuablo fora icore of farm 
duties. Asy boy can run them. 2)^ full horee power at lesi than 6 et«. 
per hour. Teetod and ready for action upon arrlTal. Made to fit 
farmers’ needs. ",Other sires up to 300 h. p. Write for free oataloe;ue. 
WEBER CAS 4 GASOLINE ENGINE COMPANY, 
Box 206i Kansas City* Mo* 
Eastern Office: 115 Liberty St., N. Y. City. 
THE APPLETON 
N 29 
HAND FODDER 
CUTTER 
IT'S A GOOD ONE and 
THE PRICE IS LOW 
-BUY IT 
Should you want a larger power ensilage and fodder 
cutter or corn busker, sheller, horse power, feed 
grinder, wood saw, windmill, farm truck, seeder, 
etc., send at once for our free Catalogue. 
^Appleton Manufacturing Co. Bafavia?m°. u.s.a. 
GUT AND SHRED, 
and 
all kinds of prreen and dry fodder 
with the WOLVERINE CUTTERS 
AND SHREDDERS. No machines 
of thlskindhave 
ever been mode 
which will doc 
more good work 
with less power than these. 
They have knives with 4 
cutting edges—a measure 
of economy. We have de¬ 
vised a special 
SHREDDER HEAD 
which fits any of these machines, being interchangeable 
with the same size of knife head. It makes two com¬ 
plete machines out of one. Each machine is equipped 
with a safety fly-wheel which Insures the machine 
against bre.ikage. Equipped with safety stop feed lever 
which insures the feeder against accident. 
CUfllfCI OHDDIEDC which will deliver the feed 
wtIlfCL bAnniCIlO straight away or to right 
or left, can be supplied wltn these cutters in any length 
desired. Our large sized machines are made with or 
without traveling feed tables. Cuts tolH inches long. 
RD CTVI CC sun CITCC We have these ma- 
wO oil Ltd ANU Olfallwi chines in all these 
styles and sizes and can supply anything which any- 
body could possibly want. 'They range in price from 
$1.90 up. Our largest machine will cut a ton of feed In 
6 minutes. Every machine is guaranteed as to quality 
of material, workmanship, capacity and quality or work. 
m TUIO in nilT and send it to us and we will 
I niu HU UU I mail you our frea feed cutter 
and farm machinery catalogue. It gives lowest prices 
on all kinds of improved machinery. 
MARVIN SMITH GO. CHICAGO. 
WELL 
DRILLING 
MACHINES 
Jver 70 sizes and styles, for drilling either deep or 
shallow wells in any kind of soil or rock. Mounted 
on wheels or on sills. With engines or horse powers. 
Strong, simple and durable. Any meebanio can 
operate them easily. Send for catalog. 
Wlt.I.IAlVIS BROS.. Ithnei* W Y- 
EXCEL GRINDING MILIS^ 
The Mill that excels them all. Best 
for llie farmer. Griiida 5 to 2'» bu>»lu*lK 
per hour of ear corn or jcniln (»f any 
kind, bone, ahell, etc., with fmin 1 to S 
ht)r«e-jK>wer. Slakea fecMl and pood 
meal. Furnished wllh or without 
crusher. We have larger mills for 
every purpo.’-e. Write for Catalogue K. 
We pay the freight. 
Excel Manufacturing: Co., 
lie Liberty Street, New York 
Save Paint 
Booflng,whlch requires 
painting every 
two years, use 
Arrow Brand 
Asphalt 
Beady Hoofing 
already sur¬ 
faced with gravel, and which needs no painting. 
ASPHALT READY ROOFING CO. send for fre* 
83 Pin^t^^NewYorkj___^^^8amgle8^ 
MAPLE SUGAR MAKERS 
E THE GRIMM SPOUT. 
'IVTriVIC TVO ItATLK from 
Assuming that 400 trees with antiquated spouts produce 800 pounds of sugar. 
Similar conditions with the Grimm Spout produces lOjO pounds. What is the 
va.ue of 2:)0 pounds of sugar and the cost of 41)0 Grimm Spouts? The gain is 
guaranteed. Freight paid on all orders of 500 or more. Agents wante d. .. 
Samples free. Gr, H. GrZ=LXlVCJV9:. 
