802 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
December 5 
THE INFLUENCE OF HOR TICUL TURE 
UPON LITERARY LIFE. 
Parts of E.S. Carman’s talk before Ibe Literary 
Club of New York, November 18: 
I would be glad if the Club and its 
guests would consider this question from 
a practical point of view. We all know 
that horticulture influences literary life. 
We do not need to prove it. What we 
should aim at is to have it influence lit¬ 
erary life a hundredfold more than it 
does or has ever done. No more telling 
or refining influence could be brought to 
bear upon literary life. 
Until a subject is pressed upon us in 
some way, we are unlikely to give it due 
attention. How many of us, for example, 
realize that the beauty of this little 
world of ours, or what we regard as 
beauty, rests almost wholly in plant 
life, and that all animal life is wholly 
dependent upon plant life ? With¬ 
out plant life, animal life could not 
exist — could never have existed, ex¬ 
cept under different conditions of which 
we cannot even conceive. Well, what 
is horticulture ? A very essential part 
of plant life. Then it may readily be 
admitted that the “ Influence of Hor¬ 
ticulture upon Literary Life ” is second 
to that of no other influence whatever. 
It is a pity that terraculture is not a 
popular word—the culture of the soil of 
the earth. We may fairly divide it into 
two classes ; agriculture, the culture of 
edible plants in the field, and horticul¬ 
ture, the culture of all other plants 
whether in the field, about our homes, 
or in the so-called garden. 
If I wanted to educate my child so 
that he would be best fitted to make his 
mark in literary life, and do the most 
good as a writer or speaker, I would seek 
to interest him in horticulture, using the 
word in its broad sense, more than in any 
other study, and this, too, whether he 
were to be a minister, a lawyer, a poli¬ 
tician, a physician, a historian, a scien¬ 
tific writer, a poet, or a novelist. Why ? 
Because it is the study of God’s own 
most fascinating Nature, and stimulates 
us, more than any other one study, to 
study all other studies, and that, too, 
from a growing motive of benevolence, 
a refined sense of doing good for the 
sake of doing good, and from a desire to 
get nearer to Nature’s Creator. May we 
claim the same for mechanical, mathe¬ 
matical studies or the study of the 
languages ? Now, my friends, I am not 
going to weary you with further gener¬ 
alities. 
I have been the editor of a rural paper 
for nearly 25 years, and I have been suc¬ 
cessful beyond any hopes that entered 
my head in those early days. What led 
to this sort of literary life—a life that, 
in my case at any rate, has proved singu¬ 
larly free of worry, solicitude, over¬ 
whelming disappointments and the jeal¬ 
ousies and hatred that are too often a 
part of success or failure in other liter¬ 
ary vocations ? First, a study of botany ; 
next, the pleasures of gathering and 
tracing native plants and grasses ; next, 
collecting all of the choicest ornamental 
shrubs and trees suited to the climate 
of our country home ; last, crossing or 
hybridizing plants. From this last, I 
have derived more real comfort, delight 
and cumulative incentive than from any 
other study or work of my life, and it 
has been chiefly a work of love. At the 
age of nearly 60, my regret is that time 
flies quite too fast, and I am warned 
that, while the spirit was never before so 
anxious to keep up and go on with this 
fascinating work, a marked indifference 
on the part of the flesh is beginning to 
manifest itself. 
It is natural enough that we should 
love our children, because we created 
them and because they are part of our 
flesh and blood. But it is natural, too, 
that we should feel a deep interest in 
the plants—whether economic or orna¬ 
mental, which we create, though not a 
part of our flesh and blood. 
We now know that we may change 
plants by cross-breeding just the same 
as we may change animals by a judicious 
or injudicious selection of parents. 
The field, however, in the vegetable 
world is infinitely greater—more varied 
—than that in the animal world, because 
the genera, species and varieties, are 
infinitely more varied. 
Well, I am bold enough to assume 
that my audience may be interested to 
know what plants I chose in my early 
days, and partly since, as the parents of 
my purposed creations. In this brief 
presentation, I may touch upon only a 
few of them. 
My first essay was with pelargoniums, 
or geraniums as they are popularly 
called. These plants might well be se¬ 
lected by those who would begin the. 
work of crossing. I dare say that any 
sunny window—even in the city—would 
answer the purpose, and I would beg 
my fairer hearers to bear this in mind. 
I procured all the best varieties of those 
days—the plain-leaved and the tricolors 
—several hundred in all. I worked at 
them for two winters, the result being 
some 5,000 cross-bred seeds; and from 
these seeds nearly 2,000 seedlings. I 
could not tell you all that was interest¬ 
ing and instructive about this whole¬ 
some work in an evening’s talk. There 
were strange forms, deformed leaves, 
peculiar flowers, all sorts of variega¬ 
tions—yet there were less than a half 
dozen plants, superior in all ways to 
their parents. 
A disappointment ? Yes, truly ; but 
a disappointment that goaded one on 
to further disappointments, or to possi¬ 
ble successes. This led me to field and 
garden work. My next endeavor was 
to cross wheat and rye, which, in so far 
as we know had never been attempted, 
as, botanically, they belong to not only 
different species, but genera. The re¬ 
sult of my first season’s work was nine 
hybrid seeds. These were carefully 
planted in the early fall and carefully 
protected. 
Judge of my joy and surprise when, 
the next year, eight of the nine plants 
(one died) bore heads as different from 
one another as rye is different from 
wheat. Every year since, until the 
present, the work of inter-crossing has 
been continued. Upwards of 20 varie¬ 
ties have been introduced. Some of 
them are distinctly neither rye nor 
wheat. The great trouble has been 
that they would not become fixed. They 
still vary from year to year, and it is 
quite problematical whether these new 
cereals will or will not prove of more 
value than the best kinds of wheat. 
I must pass over my failures and suc¬ 
cesses for several years, to dwell upon 
what may most interest my audience. 
Many of you are familiar with the Japan 
rose, Rosa rugosa. It is among the 
hardiest of roses. Its foliage is charm¬ 
ing, quite different from that of all 
other roses. The leaflets are very large, 
thick—almost leathery—and wrinkled, 
so to say ; hence the specific name 
rugosa. It blooms during the entire 
summer and fall. The flowers are single 
(five large petals), white in one variety, 
light pink in another and about three 
inches in diameter when fully expanded. 
The bud is pointed. * * * I could 
not learn that any crosses with this and 
other roses had ever been attempted. 
An inquiry in the London Garden failed 
to call out any replies to the contrary. 
Rosa rugosa bears seeds freely. The 
fruits or “heps”, as often called, are 
large and when ripe, of a bright red 
color, and these fruits persist until after 
severe frosts. We made the pink rugosa 
the mother and in our first efforts, used 
the pollen of Harison’s Yellow—an Aus¬ 
trian rose also of extreme hardiness. 
This bears double yellow flowers during 
June. The leaflets are notably small. 
Many viable seeds formed which gave 
us a dozen plants the next spring. The 
very first to bloom bore leaflets closely 
resembling the thick, beautiful leaflets 
of the mother. Now, my friends, judge 
of our surprise and delight when this 
hybrid developed buds closely resem¬ 
bling those of Gen. Jacqueminot. The 
buds unfolded. The flower was semi¬ 
double and so closely of the fragrance 
and color of Jacqueminot, that the one 
could not be distinguished from the 
other. It blooms more or less during 
the entire season. Here was a revela¬ 
tion to be sure. The father has small 
leaflets and yellow flowers. The mother 
large leaflets and pink, single flowers. 
The child has leaflets larger than the 
mother’s and dark red flowers. Nature, 
in this instance, combined pink and yel¬ 
low to make a dark red. We have kept 
up this work every season since, using 
Teas for the pollen parent, hoping to get 
a yellow flower with rugosa foliage. 
Thus far, we have failed. It would take 
an entire evening to tell you of the re¬ 
markable seedlings we have grown—few 
of them of any value except as curiosi¬ 
ties and as alluring one on and on to 
develop the hidden possibilities of rose 
hybridization. 
Most of my hearers are aware that 
some plants bear male, others female 
flowers, others both male and female, 
though in separate flowers. Of the last, 
the corn plant is the most familiar il¬ 
lustration. The “ tassel” bears the male 
or pollen flowers, the “ silks ” are the 
pistils of the females. Every kernel has 
a so-called silken thread — the pistil. 
Every silk must, when receptive, receive 
pollen from the tassel, or there will be 
no kernel. 
A familiar example of plants, some of 
which bear female or pistillate flowers 
only, some of which bear both stamens 
and pistils, is the strawberry. If we 
make beds of the pistillates only, far 
away from the perfect or pollen-produc¬ 
ing kinds, our plants will be utterly 
barren, except as insects may carry pol¬ 
len from neighboring plantations. It 
would be very easy for our friends to 
cross strawberries either in the country 
or in the city yards. The seeds germi¬ 
nate as freely as do those of poppies or 
balsam, and the seedlings usually fruit 
the second year. Oh, the pleasing watch¬ 
ing and the waiting for our vegetable 
(Continued on next page). 
Life 
Is misery to thousands of people who have the 
taint of scrofula in their blood. For this terrible 
affliction there is no remedy equal to 
Sarsaparilla 
The best—in fact the One True Blood Purifier. 
HnnH’c Pillc cure Liver Ills; easy to 
A ^ ^° take, easy to operate. 25c. 
c 
orn 
is a vigorous feeder and re¬ 
sponds well to liberal fertiliza¬ 
tion. On corn lands the yield 
increases and the soil improves 
if properly treated with fer¬ 
tilizers containing not under 
7 % actual 
Potash. 
A trial of this plan costs but 
little and is sure to lead to 
profitable culture. 
All about Potash—the results of its use by actual ex¬ 
periment on the best farms in the United States—is 
told in a little book which we publish and will gladly 
mail free to any farmer in America who will write for it. 
GERMAN KALI WORKS, 
93 Nassau St., New York. 
f^ 6 T s °HS 
Otto 
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K 
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Summer and Autumn Catalogue 
of POT-GROWN and layer STRAW¬ 
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with kind words for ROGERS FRESH-DUG DANS- 
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Suffolk County, L. I., N. Y., 11 y 9/1896. s As we’ve told you before, we tell you again, 
ISAAC C. ROGERS, Dansville, N. Y.: 5 no matter where you have been buying, we 
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