Part 70

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There are many who suppose it necessary to leave the second growth of grass undisturbed, to rot on the ground, in order to preserve the fertility of old meadows in grass where top dressing with manure is not resorted to. But such management is oftentimes extremely hurtful, and the injury is proportioned to the amount left untrodden and unfed. If the amount left standing, or laying loose upon the surface, be considerable, it makes a harbor for mice, which will, under cover of the old grass, intersect the surface of the land with paths innumerable, from which they cut all the grass that comes in their way.

MARY HOWITT’s USE OF FLOWERS.

Here is another of those beautiful gems which can never be brought to the light too often. And when more appropriately than in the middle of our spring-time, while bursting buds and fragrant blossoms are delighting every sense?

God might have made the earth bring forth Enough for great and small, The oak-tree and the cedar-tree, Without a flower at all.

We might have had enough, enough For every want of ours, For luxury, medicine, and toil, And yet have had no flowers.

The ore within the mountain mine Requireth none to grow, Nor does it need the lotus flower To make the river flow.

The clouds might give abundant rain, The nightly dews might fall, And the herb that keepeth life in man, Might yet have drunk them all.

Then wherefore, wherefore were they made And dyed with rainbow light, All fashioned with supremest grace, Upspringing day and night?

Springing in valleys green and low, And on the mountains high, And in the silent wilderness, Where no man passeth by?

Our outward life requires them not, Then wherefore had they birth? To minister delight to man— To beautify the earth.

To comfort man, to whisper hope Whene’er his faith is dim, For whoso careth for the flowers, Will much more care for Him.

WHAT ARE FLOWERS GOOD FOR?

“I have said and written a great deal to my countrymen about the cultivation of flowers, ornamental gardening, and rural embellishments; and I would read them a homily on the subject every day of every remaining year of my life, if I thought it would induce them to make this a matter of particular attention and care. When a man asks me, what is the use of shrubs and flowers, my first impulse is always, to look under his hat and see the length of his ears. I am heartily sick of measuring everything by a standard of mere utility and profit; and as heartily do I pity the man, who can see no good in life but in the pecuniary gain, or in the mere animal indulgences of eating and drinking.”—Colman’s Agricultural Tour.

We protest against the sauciness of the italicized line. Mr. Colman never feels any such impulse; and if he does, he ought to suspect his own ears. Nothing is more preposterous than interflagellations among men on the matter of likes and dislikes. Every man selects his ruling passion, and scoffs at such as do not grow enthusiastic with him. A market gardener rails at a florist for fol-de-rol trifles; and the florist looks at the length of the fellow’s ears who has nothing but turnips, onions, and cabages; while a big Miami farmer, who puts in his five-hundred-acre corn-patch, by way of summer amusement, regards both as small affairs. We find no fault with those who possess a super-ardent enthusiasm for flowers; but when they throw it in other people’s faces, and call them brutes and asses, for not liking pretty flowers, we think the thing has been carried quite far enough. We love good manners along with pretty flowers.

THE BLIGHT IN THE PEAR-TREE.

ITS CAUSE AND A REMEDY FOR IT.

The year 1844 will long be remembered for the extensive ravages of that disease hitherto denominated fire-blight. Beginning at the Atlantic coast, we have heard of it in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, and as far as Tennessee; and it is probable that it has been felt in every fruit-growing State in the Union where the season of 1843 was the same as that west of the Alleghany range, namely, cold in spring, dry throughout the summer, and a wet and warm fall, with early and sudden winter.

In Indiana, and Ohio the blight has prevailed to such an extent as to spread dismay among cultivators; destroying entire collections—taking half the trees in large orchards—affecting both young and old trees, whether grafted or seedings in soils of every kind. Many have seen the labor and fond hope of years cut off, in one season, by an invisible destroyer, against which none could guard; because, in the conflicting opinions, none were certain whether the disease was atmospheric, insect or chemical.

I shall now proceed to describe that blight known in the western States (without pretending to identify it with the blight known in New York and New England), to examine the theories proposed for its causation, and to present what now seems to me the true cause.

I. DESCRIPTION.—Although the signs of it, as will appear in the sequel, may be detected long before the leaves put out in the spring, yet its full effects do not begin to appear until May, or if the spring be backward, until June. On the wood of the last year will be found a point where the bark is either dead and dry, or else at the same point the bark will be puffed, softened, or sappy with thickened sap—these two appearances indicating only different degrees of the same blight. Wherever the bark is dead and dry, the limb will flourish above it, make new wood, ripen its fruit, but perish the ensuing winter. In the other case, as soon as the circulation of the sap becomes active, the point described shows signs of disease, the leaf turns to a darker brown than is natural to its ordinary decay, being nearly black, and the wood perishes.

The disease, at first, blights the terminal portions of the branch; but the affection spreads gradually downward, and sometimes affects the whole trunk. The time from the first appearance of the blight to that in which any affected part dies, is various; sometimes two or three weeks—sometimes a day only; and sometimes, but rarely, even a few hours consummate the disease.

On dissecting the branch, the wood is of a dirty, brownish, yellow color; the sap thick and unctuous, of a sour disagreeable odor, like that of a fermented watermelon, on the tops of potato vines after they have been frosted. In still, moist days, where the blight is extensive in an orchard, this odor fills the air, and is disagreeably perceptible at some distance from the trees.

Sometimes the bark bursts, the sap exudes, and runs down, turning black; and its acridity will destroy vegetation on which it may drop, and shoots, at a distance from the trunk, upon which the rain washes this ichor, will soon perish. When we come to treat of the cause of this disease, it will be important to remember this malignancy of the fluids.

We are carefully to distinguish these appearances, peculiar to what I suppose ought to be called winter-blight, from another and a summer-blight. In this last, the leaf is affected at first in spots; gradually the whole leaf turns russet color and drops. Along the wood may be seen the hardened trail as of a slimy insect, of an ash color. The wood suffers very little by this summer-blight, and sometimes none. The winter-blight is found on almost all kinds of trees. This summer it has affected the apple, the pear, the peach, the quince, the English hawthorn, privet, black birch, Spanish chestnut, elder, and calycanthus. I enumerate the most of these kinds on the authority of J. H. James, of Urbana, Ohio, and C. W. Elliott, of Cincinnati, having observed it myself only on fruit-trees.

II. THEORIES.—A variety of theories exist as to the causes of this disease. Some are mere imaginations; some are only ingenious; and some so near to what I suppose to be the truth, that it is hardly possible to imagine how the discovery was not made.

The injury is done in the fall, but is not seen till spring or summer, or even the next fall. Thus, six months or a year intervene between the cause and the effect—a sufficient reason for the difficulty of detecting the origin of the evil.

1. Some have alleged that the rays of the sun, passing through vapors which arise about the trees, concentrate upon the branches, and destroy them by the literal energy of fire. Were this true, the young and tender shoots would suffer first and most; all pear-trees would suffer alike; moist and hot summers would be affected with blight; herbaceous plants would suffer more than ligneous: all of which results are contrary to facts.