268 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAN. {1 Srpr., 1897. 
growth and leaf-size; but the relative advantages of cutting-back at the time 
of planting or in the following autumn are not yet clear. Different methods. 
of summer and autumn pruning have not yet led to any striking conclusions. 
Root-pruning, on the other hand, produced immediate results in loss of vigour, 
which is not surprising, seeing that it was carried out in the year after the 
lanting, when it could not have been needed. The manuring trials appear to 
eee failed, in consequence of drought. It is astonishing to notice that trees 
planted in November grew much less vigorously than those planted in the 
following January or March, and probably this is due to accidental circum- 
stances, as it is not likely that horticultural authorities are wrong in recommend- 
ing autumn planting, after all their experience. Some experiments in the yield 
and size of berry of different varieties of strawberries will be interesting to 
fruitgrowers. The report is the first one, and it is to be expected that the 
systematic experiments and careful observations begun on the fruit farm will 
yield valuable results in the future. 
Ir is possible that the estimate given in last month’s number of the Journal 
of this season’s output of coffee was much below what our correspondent has 
since been informed may be the return. But accurate information seems to 
be difficult to obtain. We will always gladiy publish reliable information from 
the planters. 
Ws take the following from an American exchange merely to show what sort of 
nonsense is occasionally written to foreign countries by persons whose habit is 
is to decry the country which supports them. It is an extract from a letter 
purporting to have been written by a Sydney resident to the United States :— 
“ You must not imagine from the preceding that we are deficient of men 
of enterprise. Instance the following: In our town of Paramatta three years 
ago some twenty public-spirited townsmen, to assist the fruitgrowers and 
relieve the glutted market, joined and formed a jam company. Az the end of 
first year they reported a profit of 30 per cent. on capital, and issued a note to 
increase the capital fourfold. Thinking it was a good thing, I was inclined to 
take shares, but first went to the factory and saw the managers—an old man 
and wife, seventy years of age each, assisted by an elderly lady and young girl. 
I fancy the wife was boss. Machinery: Two pans, to contain about 100 
[apples ?j each, and a paring machine. This quite satisfied me. I took no 
shares, ‘The company continued a second year and burst up, and the stock- 
holders lost their money. Zhe capital was $1,000. Just imagine: To start a 
jam factory to relieve the glut on a capital of $1,000 [£200 about]! I may tell 
you in this company were a bank manager, doctor, lawyers, soft-goods man, and 
fruitgrowers. ‘The above are facts, though I have treated the affair as a joke.” 
Iv is written in some American book: Fondness for the soil comes back to a 
man after he has gone the whole round of pleasure and business. The love of 
digging in the ground is among the last, as it is also among the first of our 
delights. It is as sure to come back to a man as he is sure to go under the 
ground and stay there. 
SHOW FIXTURES. 
Southern Queensland and Border Agricultural 
and Pastoral Association, Nerang ... 8 Sept. 
Rosewood Show... vss Be ax aSLSEN Us 
Agricultural and Pastoral Society of Southern 
Queensland, Beenleigh ... x5 ... 10 Sept. 
We regret that by inadvertence the name of W. D. Armstrong, Esq., 
M.1L.A., was omitted from the list of names of those gentlemen present on the 
invitation of the Minister for Agriculture (the Hon. A. J. Thynne) at the 
official opening of the Queensland Agricultural College on the 9th July last. 
Mr. Armstrong met His Excellency the Governor at Gatton, and drove him to 
the College. At the close of the proceedings Mr. Armstrong’s carriage was. 
placed at the disposal of the visitors for the drive to the College Railway Station. 
