selves; they are in good condition, rarely clear up all their feed at once, and we have more eggs than we care to eat. To prevent their wanting to sit, I regularly look up all the eggs as laid, and never leave but two eggs in a nest. Most of the twenty are late pullets, that will not lay for a month or two to come.

Preserving Flowers in Sand.

Those of our readers who attended the late

Horticultural Fair in this city did not fail to notice those two framed wreaths of uatural flowers that hung upon the wall near the horticultural tools. They were the admiration of all, and many times did we hear visitors wondering by what process they were thus pre

served in their natural form and colors. It is this:

But there is yet another point which I consider of some consequence, and that is "breed.' Shanghais will lay well, but their desire to sit when they think proper is almost unconquera- Get the finest and whitest of river or lake ble, very provoking, and not conducive to lay- sand, wash it so clean that the water when ing; Spanish, crested, are everlasting layers, flowing from it will be pure as if from the well. exhaust themselves in laying during summer, Heat it very hot and while hot mix it thoroughfind moulting difficult, and are long recovering ly with stearic acid in the proportion of one from it. Game, in my opinion, lay the most b. of the latter to 100 lbs. of sand. Let it delicious eggs, but they are rather fastidious cool. Take a small common seive and nail layers, and sometimes a trifle pugnacious. My boards under the bottom to prevent the sand present fowls are white Dorkings. I consider from running through; place enough sand in them the best of all fowls for general purposes the seive to hold the flowers in position-not -capital layers, sitters, mothers, and for eat- covering them; then, with a sheet of paper ing; what more can any one want? Do not twisted in the form of a cone or tunnel, carebreed them in-and-in, then they are hardy; if fully let the sand pass through it, between, you do, of course any breed will fail. Leave around, and over the flowers-cover about half the eggs in the nest, and they will sit when an inch. Set by the stove, or in some warm enough are laid; take all away and they for- place where the sand will be kept at a tempersake the nest. They are first rate for the ta-ature of about 70° Fahr. When they have reble; their uniformity is pleasing, their white mained sufficiently long, remove the boards plumage protects them against the sudden carefully from the bottom and let the sand run changes of our variable climate, and the feath-out, leaving your flowers preserved in perfection. ers being all white are the more valuable for beds. Cor. London Field.

The only difficulty is to know when the process is complete, different plants differing in the time required. Those with thick leaves and petals needing more than light ones. Seven hours are sufficient for some, while others require twelve and even more. Experience CORRESPONDING EDITOR. alone can determine this. It is best always

THE HORTICULTURIST.

A. G. HANFORD,

:

for a beginner to experiment with a single plant at a time at first. When he has succeeded with a certain variety and noted the time required, he can proceed to others, and in a short time become versed in this art. It should be mentioned that the flowers for this purpose should be picked dry-say midday, after the dew has all evaporated.-Prairie Farmer.

What to do with Summer Fruit.

What Apple Trees are most Hardy? MR. EDITOR-I wish to enquire through your paper what apple trees have proved the most hardy and productive in our State? I am satisfied that we all need more light on this subject. Thousands of dollars have been worse than thrown away in attempting to cultivate trees which were not adapted to our northern Much summer fruit is very transient, decaying climate. The country is filled up with tree ven before it falls from the tree, and sometimes even before it is ripe. This is true of salesmen, recommending this and that sort, many pears. Picked, or shaken from the tree who know nothing as to the hardiness and pro-and picked over, they make excellent perry, ductivenesss of the plants they are selling here in this climate. As most of us came from the east, we bring our notions as to varieties with The consequence is we order trees unsuitable to this latitude, and failure is the result; and many give up in despair, saying it is useless to think of raising good fruit here.

us.

G. G. WHITE.

which is like cider, but more delicate and winelike. It needs a cool cellar to undergo its fermentation in. Apples should be made into cider. Sweet, it brings a high price in mardoes not make so good cider as later when ferket, and is a delightful cooling beverage, but mentation is less rapid. The small hand mills and presses are very good for pressing fruits, and a family may supply itself with the juices for preservation, and considerable quantities for sale.

The Wisconsin Seedling.

This interesting variety of the Strawberry is fairly shown in the above illustration. Other cuts may display a larger fruit, and yet we very much question whether the fruit itself which they pretend to represent would really prove to be larger or make a more attractive appearance.

According to Hon. Emil Rothe, who produced it originally by hybridization of the Triomphe de Gand, the Austrian Giant, and a very splendid French variety, it "is very prolific. Two years old plants yield from 150 to 250 berries; 287 have been counted on one single stalk."

66

runners, it is sure to bear during the whole of the months of June, July and August." Fruit very large-some berries "measuring 53 inches in circumference, and 1 inches in diameter." Flesh of the berry white and very substantial; the flavor delicious, pineapple-like, subacid. Plant hardy, enduring the cold of winter if left unprotected.

"The stem is generally thick, and strong enough to bear the fruit without bending down. The blossoms form a kind of grape cluster, and while some fruit ripens, blossoms and green buds may be seen on the same cluster."

It is this splendid variety of the strawberry that we offer as a prize for subscriptions to the FARMER. See advertisement on cover, and a

When properly treated and kept free from full description in May No.

Dr. Jno. A. Kennicott.

This eminent practical Horticulturist departed this life on the 4th day of June, 1863, at "The Grove," his home in Cook Co., Ill.

From a biographical sketch, accompanied with an excellent photographic engraving, in the June 13th issue of the Prairie Farmer, Chi

cago, we glean some notes of his early history. He was born in 1800, in Montgomery Co.,

N. Y. He was called the "Old Doctor," because he was the eldest of thirteen living children, among whom were several doctors. His parents were born in Rhode Island, but of somewhat noted English and Scotch origin. His father was of the pioneer class who, after several removals, finally landed in the before mentioned county, Ill.

The Old Doctor, when quite young, became proficient in Botany, on which science he delivered a course of lectures in Buffalo, at the age of twenty-one, and at twenty-three commenced the study of medicine at the same place. His active habits of life, both physical and mental, formed, perhaps, from necessity at an early age, continued a remarkable feature in his character while living.

In the practice of his profession he visited several of the western and southwestern cities, and, in the capacity of editor and publisher, was a resident of New Orleans for several years. At the age of thirty-six he became a resident of Illinois.

Societies, he won for himself hosts of friends, and a western-wide notoriety, sealed by the easy familiarity and geniality of manner which ever recognized the real fruit-grower as brother in a good cause. Many in this State

will remember his plain, off-hand-talk lecture in the old Senate Chamber before the State Agricultural Society, at our last Fair, in 1860, afterwards published in the Society's Transactions. It is characteristic of the man-that practical, direct teaching which ever tells for the end desired.

At the "Grove," his home, made very attractive outwardly by perseveringly applying his theories to practice, says the editor of the Prairie Farmer, "no one could spend any time with him, especially at his home, wandering through his spacious and well filled grounds, where every living thing seemed to find in him a friend and companion, or in the villa erected with so much taste, in listening to his enter. taining conversation, without feeling that he had been benefitted by the interview.

"In life the Doctor has been erecting monuments to his, memary all over the northwest that are to last longer than marble. Thousands of homes have them growing in their grounds in the beautiful, tapering, pyramidal evergreens, especially, which were such favorites at "The Grove;" and, as each year adds stature to them and they point upward, they will always be a reminder of him who was always alive to everything tending to improve or J. C. P. awaken interest in Horticultural matters in the land." MADISON, Wis.

Homely Flowers.

Some ten years later he seems to have turned his attention particularly to horticultural and agricultural science, becoming a practical nurFrom this time he has been widely seryman. known, not only as a pioneer of western civilization and intelligence, but particularly in the It is not always the newest that is the most horticultural field, a practical, earnest worker; in the varied capacity of editor or publisher beautiful flower. We have presented illustraof the Prairie Farmer, for three years from the tions of some of these that were eminently close of 1852; for several years Corresponding worthy of the high favor they enjoy, and we Secretary of the Illinois State Agricultural So- now pay our respects to a few whose commonciety; and President of the Illinois State Hor-ness has so nearly run them out of the gardens of the more pretentious that they are likely, ticultural Society in 1861.

In all these, together with his numerous at no distant day, to require re-introduction, lectures before Agricultural and Horticultural as something quite new under the sun.

more general cultivation in these days. The blossoms are very various as to color, and are so profuse as to almost hide the plant. Growing in a bed they are but a little behind the Hyacinth for beauty and attractiveness.

Orchard Culture in the West.

At the last meeting of the American Pomological Society, held in Boston last fall, Dr. J. A. Warder, of Cincinnati, read a paper on orchard culture in the West. From our own observation, we can bear testimony to the correctness of one or two points touched in the following remarks copied from the Doctor's Essay. We have reference to the pasturing of hogs in the orchard, planting low headed trees, and near together so as to shade the ground. We are familiar with an orchard near Dubuque, some fifteen years old, and of about two acres in extent. In that orchard the trees have attained a large size, and stand so near together that in many cases the tops nearly, if not quite, interlace their branches. The orchard has been in grass ever since we knew it a period of some six years, and during that time, we believe, it has never failed to produce a fair crop of fruit. The ground is so completely shaded that the grass crop amounts to little or nothing. Upon the south side of the orchard,

orchards of the old style, with tall trunks and long, naked branches, furnished only with a brush of decrepit spray at their extremities, while their roots are starved beneath an old sod that has been tramped and pastured for years. Under these circumstances, the trees producing an excess of blossoms and fiuit, having ceased to make any thrifty wood growth, may need a thorough cultivation, as well as severe pruning, to invite a reproduction of healthy wood and foliage. The damage that ensues from breaking the roots is more than overbalanced by the renewed vigor that ensues. A thorough pruning, removing the dead limbs, and thinning out those that are too close, scarifying the bark, and washing the stems with an alkaline solution, will ensure the rejuvenescence of the trees, which are then able to push forth new roots where the plow had broken the old ones, and with these adjuvants, and with the application of lime, the breaking up and after cultivation of the soil will be of the greatest advantage to the old orchard. Still, it is a question whether it be not better to avoid the necessity for this treatment; and it is believed that by a suitable course this necessity may be obviated. The proper cultivation of the young trees does not materially injure the roots, and it preserves the soil in a condition most favorable for their renewal. In an orchard that has been thus cultivated, there will always be a system of roots at a depth below the influence of the plow; these are permanent. If, on the contrary, by mulching or otherwise, the roots have been brought very "When the orchard has acquired a sufficient near the surface, the thorough plowing may growth, and assumes its condition of maturity seriously injure the trees by too much breakand fruit-bearing, it no longer so imperatively ing of these important organs; here, as in requires to be cultivated, and is somewhat bet- other cases, the less of two evils must be choster if let alone; having been laid down to clo-en, nor can there be any question as to the ver, or clover and orchard grass, it should be made use of as a hog walk. No other stock should ever be permitted to set hoof upon the soil appropriated to the orchard. The swine alone should be allowed to pasture it, and to consume the fallen fruit, thus destroying immense numbers of insects, they will keep these pests in check. They will distribute their droppings over the surface, and they may even be allowed to root in the soil, to some extent, with their snouts. Should weeds make their appearance, they may be mowed and left upon the ground, or thrown about the trees as a mulch; but with the close planting that is now generally recommended, and sometimes practiced, and with the low headed trees that are so very much preferred by all who have had an opportunity of observing their advantages, there is really little space left for any crop among the trees, except grass, and this will scarcely grow beneath them, in the thick shade of their depending boughs.

some of the outer trees show the effects of sun

and wind by their inclination to the northeast and blackened decay upon the sunny side of the stem. Dr. W. says:

"Shall an old orchard ever be plowed? is a question often asked by those who have neglected their trees, or who have fallen heirs to

propriety of plowing in the condition supposed above, that of an orchard showing signs of decrepitude from neglect of pruning, and of proper care of trees, with a grass-bound surface of the soil beneath them, and hard, mossy bark, so that they are well styled hide-bound. The condition of a, thickly planted and well grown orchard, with low heads, shading the ground, and mulched with the decaying grass and leaves, is more like that of the primeval forest, and such trees may be allowed to conit may be doubted whether, if occasionally tinue for many years without plowing; indeed limed, they be not really better without this

disturbance of their roots."-Iowa Homestead.

Seeding down Orchards.

MR. EDITOR-In relation te seeding orchards, my experience is against it, particularly with clover. I tried it and thought to keep up the fertility by top-dressing. I got great crops of hay, but injured my orchard