economy is to spread over the bed a good dressing of compost before winter sets in. This compost must not only be clean but rich. In the spring it need only be loosened about the plants, and what falls into the alleys will be cultivated under. In lieu of this you can use autumn leaves; only do not cover the plants so as to choke them-let the crowns stick out from the covering.

There are several enemies of the strawberry plant, the worst being the crown borer. This is one of the curculios, and the grub eats its way into the crown of the plant, which withers just as the fruit is ripening. In the Southern States a weevil or small, black beetle attacks buds and blossoms and destroys the stamens. The pistilate varieties are safest in those localities, because what the bug is after is to reach the ovary. The leaf roller is a yellowish caterpillar which feeds on strawberry leaves, and sometimes makes a good deal of trouble. The worst pest of all is the June bug or May beetle, whose grub appears above ground every third year. The ground mole will be likely to appear in great numbers at the same time, and should be encouraged in his efforts to get at these grubs.

In some sections rust and leaf blight are very troublesome, and it becomes necessary to reject varieties that are peculiarly liable to become diseased. The remedy for all these forms of disease is Bordeaux mixture; apply this very early in the spring, and repeat it once or twice during blossoming season. Burn over old beds always, and never set your new beds with plants from diseased plots.

I am writing mainly for those who desire just a few strawberries for home use, and I am going to confine my directions mainly to this kind of gardening. However, it may be well enough to know what strawberries are worth where the conditions are most favorable and the cultivation is on a large scale. I suppose Arkansas and Missouri are the banner States, and if you will follow the Ozark Mountains you will find nearly ten thousand acres of strawberries. Two thousand carloads go to market every year, some of the crates reaching New York, Philadelphia and Boston. The growers in these two States take in considerably over two millions of

dollars every year, and the average income per acre is over one hundred dollars, after deducting the cost of cultivation and picking. It needs, however, a peculiar temperament, with a deal of executive tact, to carry on this business successfully. I hear of one farm that yielded a gross income of one hundred thousand dollars in a single year.

The sex characteristic is very prominent in the strawberry, and it has a good deal to do with success in growing them. The larger part of seediings and new sorts offered to the public have heretofore been what we call imperfect berries. These sorts require for neighbors varieties that can furnish pollen. Recently, however, the perfect plants have become more prominent, so that four out of five of the best of the new sorts have stamens, and can take care of themselves. Besides this, strawberry plants will soon run out. This makes very little trouble in the cultivation of the berry, because we need to set new beds at least every second year. Every variety varies. somewhat according to the soil in which it grows, so that you will find Sharpless extremely high flavored on clay soil, but very low grade on sandy soil.

In making out your list of strawberries you cannot follow the catalog of any nurseryman, without doing some testing for yourself. Such dealers as Crawford and Allen who are called strawberry kings, offer us every year something a little better than we have had. It is a constant chase after the ideal; and it really is a long road that we have traveled from the Wilson of 1830 to the William Belt of 1900. The Sharpless was the first huge berry to astound people; but Bubach No. 5 set the gait. Many of the very best varieties demand such exceeding care that they are of no use for the common country home. For instance, Marshall is one of the largest and richest of fruits, but with ordinary care it gives a handful of decent berries and nothing more. Senator Dunlap and Clyde are of the finest if kept in narrow rows, otherwise they are of little use. Haverland is so weak in the stem that the heavy fruit falls over into the dirt, and in wet weather rots. Excelsior was really the earliest of berries, but like Warfield was too sour for common cultivation. Both will do for shipping berries, admirably, if

we do not care too much for the poor buyers who have them to eat. Nick Ohmer is something great when fed high and constantly cared for, otherwise worthless. This is the way it runs; only one out of fifty varieties can hold its own when disseminated.

Kitty

For a list that you can safely rely upon in a quiet country garden, take first of all the berry that, so far, I place at the head of all, the William Belt. This is one of the noblest strawberries I have ever grown. The plant is vigorous and will adjust itself to all kinds of soils. It will hold its own against odds, and will carry heavy crops. without continuous culture. The berry is a big one, and its quality is right up at the front. The three strawberries recommended for home gardens by Mr. Crawford, are Senator Dunlap, Kitty Rice, and Latest. I have tried all of these, and believe his selection to be admirable. Rice I should place close after Wm. Belt. Then I would take for the third, Sample a berry that has not failed in any part of the country. The plants are strong and healthy, carrying a big crop of large dark colored berries. I am not sure whether Gandy can be displaced by Latest, but at any rate it is not only one of the latest but one of the best. Bubach No. 5 and Haverland are two of the older sorts that cannot be displaced. They are ideals in every way, except that Haverland has a weak stem, which it overloads with a lot of long, large berries, a little too soft. One of the most wonderful berries that I have ever grown is Thompson's Mark Hanna, a magnificent fruit in size, yet bearing something more than a mere sample or two.

I find in the Southern States that Lady Thompson, originated by the same man that gave us Mark Hanna, is one of the most successful berries that can be planted. It is everywhere in the South, and I have seen plants as big as a half bushel. I think they overfeed the plants, and get more foliage than fruit. In some sections they have gone crazy over commercial fertilizers. In Texas, Goree is standing very high, and I found it equally fine in Florida. In North Carolina the great berry is Climax, and this also does admirably farther South, and ranks very high in our Northern gardens. There is in Rio Vista, Va., an old man who has given his best years to

improving the strawberry; it is Mr. M. T. Thompson, and he has not only sent out those varieties I have already noticed as from him, but he considers his No. 2 the handsomest and nearest perfection. It certainly is a wonderful berry. He writes me that he works sometimes a whole year with thousands of seedlings, without securing one that he considers worthy of dissemination. His 503 and 124 are two sorts that are worthy of trial everywhere. With me they are noble berries and very prolific. Miller and Mrs. Miller and Beaver are among the very fine new sorts; and I see the best authorities are speaking very highly of Jim. Probably Cardinal is, all in all, as good a new sort as we have had sent out during the last three years. Do not plant anything new in large amounts. Test your new varieties for at least one year in a small way.

I should like to talk on about this berry. clear to the end of my article. I never can look at a strawberry bed without being fascinated, and it makes my fingertips tingle to read about new sorts. For many years I have kept thirty or forty sorts on trial, and have had a deal of fun out of it. I am not sure that the berry is the most wholesome in the world, but I never saw a berry of any sort-I mean garden berryor fruit of any sort that I did not think more wholesome than beef and mutton. Somehow I get to be more and more of a vegetarian as I get older, and by the time I am ninety I expect to live on fruit almost exclusively. Strawberries poison only those who have blood already poisoned, and with them it brings the rheum to the surface. If there be a living being who can resist strawberry shortcake he should be served with blackberry pie in its place; and if that will not do take yellow and red raspberries with Jersey cream and let him perish on that. In other words I mean to grow strawberries, and eat them in spite of dietetic warnings. In Florida I am using them as borders for my flower beds. I like strawberry plants about the house, where I can watch their development, and in the morning, when I go out to see how the world goes, I like to pick out a great scarlet beauty that says good-morning to

me.

I like a cherry tree, whether it be in blossom or in fruit. In blossom it is the

glory of May, and the fruit is the pride of June. I like to look up from my strawberry bed, and have the crimson below matched by the crimson above. Then you can keep the fruit on the trees if you please until August, when the cherry becomes really ripe, and deliciously rich and sweet. To do this, one must cover his trees with mosquito netting, to keep the birds off. Only be fair about it, for these allies of ours deserve their full share. I cover forty trees, and leave twenty for the rest of the folk-those in feathers. This is part of my religion, to pay my help, and try to live on the square. I have hired the robins to destroy the worms, and to do orchestral work. There is a deal of simple piety out in God's field, if one cares to find it out. We have a great natural organ out in our orchard, and a plenty of hymns, and once in a while a prayer; and all the fest that makes rhyme and reason, faith and love-leaving out only a lot of "other worldliness." I think the birds average more religion, however, than human folks; at any rate they appreciate the cherries. have been amused to find that the catbirds learn which trees are their own. They will let mine alone, and will scold me if I approach theirs.

Cherry trees are divided into two classes, first as to their growth, second as to their hardiness, and thirdly as to their fruit. We speak of sweet cherries and of sour cherries, although the Duke cherries come in between and are half sweet, while the growth of the trees is like the sweeter sorts. The sour cherries grow readily almost everywhere from Canada to Georgia; while the sweet cherries are particular about both climate and soil. There are only a half dozen localities in the United States where they are thoroughly at home-not narrow localities. In western New York, and northern Ohio, and in southern Michigan you can pick your Black Tartarians and Gov. Woods and your Napoleon Bigavreaus to your heart's content. The far Northwest is, however, the real home of the cherry, and along the Pacific coast generally. There they have originated the Bing and the Lambert and the Republican, all of them huge and delicious fruits. I am trying these sorts both in New York and in Florida, and so far the test is favorable.

A good list of the Heart cherries would include for a small home, first of all, Gov. Wood: the very standard of quality, with fruit buds quite hardy, and the tree a stout, healthy grower. With this you should take Black Tartarian, which is superb in quality, and nearly black in color, while the tree is a remarkably vigorous grower and an immense bearer. Elton is

a third that deserves general favor, because of its high quality and its vigorous, but irregular, tree. It ripens before Gov. Wood, and Black Tartarian ripens later, so that you have quite a succession. Of the sour cherries the earliest is Early Richmond (not counting Dyehouse), but both of these can easily be left out unless you plant the former on dwarf stock. A row of dwarf Early Richmonds along the sides of your garden is useful and attractive. I should prefer to begin with the Baldwin, a new sort, growing with erect tree, and possessing fine quality. The old English Morello can follow, and can hardly be left out. The trees are bushy and will begin to bear when three feet high. You can keep these trees dwarfish if you like. Suda Hardy is a dark-colored variety that comes on later, accompanied by Montmorency the finest of all these sortslarge, delicious, and borne in heavy

crops.

Now of the cherries that come in between, that is the Dukes and Bigavreaus, I should select first of all May Duke. This is one of our earliest cherries, and the fruit is delicious, if allowed to thoroughly ripen, while the tree is erect growing. The fruit buds are not always hardy, yet I generally have a fairly good return from my May Dukes. The Late Duke is a large, light, red cherry that ripens in July. Reine Hortense is a large, bright red and very juicy cherry; almost sweet and of remarkably fine flavor. We do not find this cherry as often as we should. Empress Eugénie is another first-class cherry, growing on a stout tree and ripening in July. Windsor is one more July cherry that deserves attention and very general planting.

recommended for the hardiness of the fruit buds, but I have not found it so entirely sure when the thermometer drops to ten below zero.

I have recently added to my garden list a Russian cherry of the Morello type,

named Lutovka. The tree is a fine grower and the fruit is superior, but the tree is very slow in coming to bearing. Vladimir is another of the Russians, of good quality, but I do not see that it is in any way superior. Wragg is a very late ripening sort, of good size and of splendid quality. I think it will prove a good addition for July. Allen is a heart-shaped cherry, that goes into the sweet class, and is recommended as almost entirely free from rot. I have not yet thoroughly tested it. Dikeman I can recommend as perhaps the best addition of recent years to our list of really sweet and hardy cherries.

For a very restricted list of say half a dozen cherry trees that can be planted around the house take Gov. Wood, May Duke, Baldwin, Montmorency, Bing, and Lambert. This leaves out some fine things but that we cannot help. The cultivation of these trees is invariably: (1) mulch your trees well when planted, and keep them mulched always; (2) use no fertilizers or manures about the roots, and apply very sparingly at any time. The cherry tree like the pear tree is liable to split its bark if the growth is hurried, and then the worms set in, making short work of it. If the bark does split, remove it with a sharp knife, wash the wounds with kerosene emulsion and encourage new bark to form. Leave no lurking places for insects, and watch carefully or they will outwit you. The key of it, however, is to grow your trees slowly and steadily. This whole business of driving fruit trees on the jump is exactly as rational as whipping up horses. You will get a spurt of speed, and one or two crops, then will come disease, and a fight, and your trees will never be either a pleasant sight or profitable. I wish this lesson could be learned by all fruit growers, for it would save not only the trees and the fruit but the waste of manure.

The cherry is generally thought of as a fragile affair, and hardly to be kept over night. It is a fruit that perishes easily, but if very cautiously picked, with the stem always adhering, and laid gently into baskets that do not hold more than three or four quarts, it will carry well to market and be in good condition for a week. The

diseases that affect the cherry are black knot, leaf blight and mildew. The remedy is Bordeaux mixture, beginning the application before the buds open, and repeating two or three times. The black aphis is the worst pest, and this sometimes is absolutely destructive to the crop, as well as seriously injurious to the growth of the tree. Green aphides sometimes come in immense numbers, doing similar damage, and are very hard to subdue. Bordeaux mixture and kerosene emulsion should be applied the emulsion frequently. Another remedy that has been found effective is four pounds of quassia leaves with three or four pounds of whale-oil soap, in twenty gallons of water. First boil the soap so that it can be strained. The plum curculio often stings the cherry, but I have rarely found it a serious evil. It thins out the cherries somewhat, without greatly damaging the crop.

This last summer I ate my last cherries August 27th. Lifting the mosquito netting judiciously, I stood my head in the middle of a young Olivet tree, and there, uninterrupted, I ate my fill. By the way, I think I have forgotten to tell you that this Olivet cherry has become a great favorite of mine, and must be put into the choice list. I am not sure that it pays to have many trees covered so late and out of season. It is true about all our choice fruit, that if we do succeed in carrying them beyond their natural time of ripening, the market will hardly open to welcome them. Cherries perhaps are an exception, if an exception there be. A few Autumn strawberries would find market, but not many. Nature fixes this matter, and arranges that the plum and the pear shall fill up August and September. The apple only should fill every month, and in the South the orange. These two are the monarchs of the orchard and the fruit garden. No one ever tires of them either as food or as poems; from the great yellow Early Bough that bursts open on the turf as it falls in August, to the Albermarle Pippin that sweetens the atmosphere of your cellar in June and July. Cherries and strawberries belong to June, and there for the most part they will remain.

LUMINOUS November morning found us in the saddle at daybreak and on the Tepic trailEmerson, Randall, Bigelow, Gates and myself, with Miguel as mozo, and one pack mule to carry our necessary baggage.

Although there were some bad quagmires to circumvent below Santiago, traveling was fairly good and we reached. Navarette in mid-afternoon, where a halt was made for the night. Thence to Tepic, our route was over the San Blas road, and early the following morning we were winding up into the hills on the old Spanish highway.

This road is a part of the longest stage line in the world, running in relays from San Marcos, the nearest railroad point, to Guadalajara, Tepic, Santiago Ixcuintla, Culiacan, and on to Guaymas. During the rainy season the stages discontinue their runs over long sections of it, for there are many rivers and streams to be forded, which at that time of the year, when they are swollen to their banks, are quite impassable. During the very hot period stages run only at night, but through the more moderate season, night and day relays push on regularly from point to point.

The stage between Santiago Ixcuintla and Tepic City had just resumed its runs, and we were fortunate enough to meet it. It is a crude affair drawn by six mules, four abreast in the lead, and two on the wheel. The theory is that any road wide enough to permit the four leading mules to squeeze through will be wide enough for the stage, and usually this is true,

though not always. A driver and an armed guard sit upon the box, mail bags and baggage fill the center of the archaic vehicle, and passengers stow themselves away as best they can. It is a place of real, refined, diabolical torture. The driver has but one object in life-to go fast down hill and over rough places at the highest attainable speed. He primes himself with mescal and away he goes, dashing at a gallop down rocky hills, swinging around curves, or skirting precipices where the wheels scarce have earth to turn upon, until you and your fellow passengers, helpless prisoners within, have the breath jarred out of you, and are in constant panic lest you be turned over and hurled into some mountain gorge, or dashed to pieces upon the rocks. They do turn over sometimes, but it only now and then happens that any one is killed, or even seriously injured. To say the least, though, it annoys one dreadfully to have a leg or arm broken, and I never knew a passenger to look pleasant with a broken nose.

Tepic City is three thousand feet above the sea, and Navarrete less than a thousand, so our day's ride was pretty constantly up-hill. Pack train after pack train was passed, some of them with fifty or sixty animals, mostly mules, but some burros and an occasional horse, loaded down with all kinds of merchandiseboxes, barrels, packages and machinery. The larger trains had a horse with a cowbell attached to its neck, in the lead. This is known as the bell horse, and it carries no load. The mules are supposed to keep within earshot of the bell, and follow it meekly. Several muleteers, some on horseback, but generally afoot, were in attendance, spread down along the line