quence, and where it is some timesdifficult to get help at a fair price, I should set what gardeners call double rows; that is, to set two rows of plants about 12 or 14 inches apart each way, then leave a space of 3 to 4 feet, and then set another double row, and so continue until the piece is finished. This plan would allow most of the work to be done with the horse and cultivator. I would allow the plants to fill their intermediate spaces, and about one foot upon each side with their runners.

This will give a nice double row, and if well manured and cultivated would yield a good, though not as large a crop as closer setting and cultivation.

Where land is expensive, worth from $200 to $500 per acre, and labor can be obtained at a reasonable rate, I prefer to set in single rows, say two feet apart, and the plants about twelve or fifteen inches apart in the rows.

This is, of course, a more expensive method of cultivation, but it produces much the largest crop for the ground, and where the circumstances are favorable is, as I believe, much the more profitable.

My own rule is to put ny land in the best possible condition and then select nice, thrifty plants of the previous year's growth. Never set plants that have borne fruit.

Set them in rows as above indicated. I have experimented with them (the Wilson) at different distances, and finally settled upon the above as about the best.

Some of the ranker growing varieties, like the Crescent, may safely be set twice or more the above named distances, and they will cover the ground in a short time.

We are careful to set the plants fully as deep, and perhaps a little deeper than they stood in their native beds, still being very careful not to cover the crown of the plants with earth.

The reason for the deeper setting is that the newly plowed land will settle more or less, and although you pack the earth about the plants, as you certainly should do, it will still be very likely to settle from the roots unless the above rule is adhered to; and when this is the case, the plant is always more or less damaged.

If the weather is dry, the newly set plants should be well watered. My own experience tells me that one thorough watering, say one pint of water to the plant, is much better than to put the same amount upon them at two or three different times.

I am also satisfied that it will well repay the labor of picking off all the blossoms the first season, and thus keep the entire strength and growth of the plant within itself, and have it prepared to give us the largest possible crop the following year.

All weeds should be kept down, and the young plants have every encouragement to do their best.

One of the faults of the Wilson is that they do not always throw out as many runners as we desire. I have found the following a good plan with them:

When they begin to throw out runners, go through the beds and distribute them in about equal distances around the parent plant. For instance, suppose the plant throws out eight runners, perhaps three-fourths of them upon one side, as is often the case. When they get about ready to commence the formation of new plants, place the runners in equal distances around the parent, and place a little earth upon them, only sufficient to hold them in their place. In a few days the new plants are formed, and you will have a nice circle of new plants about the old one, all of them preparing to do their best for you the following season, instead of having a cluster of them too thick to do their best upon one side, and few or none upon the other. They will now go on radiating in all d rections and fill up the ground. I am speaking now of the Wilson; this plan may not be necessary with other varieties.

Late in the fall, after the ground freezes, they should be covered with straw, or, what I like better, marsh hay, as the latter has no foul seed in it to annoy us the following season. Cover the plants sufficiently deep to hide them from view. The covering should be left upon them until the ground is done freezing in the spring. One of the greatest benefits of winter covering is the protection given to the plants during the early spring, when the ground freezes more or less nearly every night and thaws during the day.

During this process, the land becomes what we call honey-combed, or in other words, in freezing the top of it rises somewhat from its natural position, and in doing so either starts the roots of the plants from their natural position, or breaks them off a short distance beneath the surface of the earth; either one of these will be fatal to a large crop of fruit.

Hence I leave the covering upon mine until the plants have started beneath it. After removing the covering, go through the beds and destroy every weed and blade of grass that has hitherto escaped notice. Put on a good covering of well-rotted manure, say fifteen to twenty loads per acre, or, if you can get it, fifty to seventy-five bushels of unleached ashes per acre. If leached ashes use twice the amount. I have almost invariably found it necessary to go through my beds twice during the spring before the picking commences, and occasionally three times. The beds should be kept free of weeds at any cost.

Both plants and berries need the sun to enable them to do their best. If, after all other work is done, I find that the crop promises to be an extra large one, I often put on an additional coat of manure, or, if I have used manure in the early spring, put on ashes for the second fertilizer. This will assist the late berries very much in keeping up their size and firmness, and thus add much to the value of the crop. During the picking season we sometimes have a very dry time, and unless we can water the beds artificially much of our time and labor will be lost.

For a number of years past I have had no vines out of the reach of artificial watering. I find one thorough wetting much better than two or three sprinklings. As regards the amount of expense that may be incurred for

this purpose, each grower must be governed by the value to be added to his crop, and the expense necessary to add such value. It is an important question, and should be well considered by those interested in growing this little queen of berries.

If you have had a very large crop, as you are very likely to have if you have followed these directions, examine the beds carefully as soon as the picking season is over, and if the vines look exhausted and are throwing out but very few runners, it is better to plow them under at once and fill the ground with some other crop than to try to care for the plants another year, and then not get sufficient fruit to pay for your time and labor. I refer now only to the Wilson. I have never yet been able to make any other variety bear itself to death the first season, but have repeatedly had the Wilson come so near to it that they were not worth caring for another year. If the yield has been only a moderate one, the second crop will probably be as good, and perhaps better than the first.

Such has, of late years, been about my method of cultivating the Wilson, after more than twenty years of experimenting. I do not consider 200 bushels, or 6,400 boxes, an extra crop. I have repeatedly had much more than the amount named, and sometimes double the amount. In fact, I will not cultivate for any length of time any variety that will not yield at least 6,000 boxes per acre. Still I must confess that I have never succeeded in getting it from any other variety, the Crescent Seedling alone excepted, and this is so soft with me as to make it about worthless for shipping, and not by any means as valuable as the Wilson for the home market.

Of the many other varieties that have been put forward, had their brief day, and then passed away, I scarcely know what to say.

Some of them have doubtless done well in some places and under some circumstances, while for the average grower they have been entirely worth

less.

Years ago, when Mr. Knox was, as I doubt not, succeeding well with the Jucunda, I sent to him and obtained some of the plants, and did my best with them for a number of years. I had some magnificent fruit from them, but do not believe that I ever grew one quart of them that cost me as little as fifty cents.

Seth Boyden's No. 30, Triomphe de Gand, Sharpless, and many others that might be named, are large and beautiful to look upon, but with me are worthless for market, or at least for any market in the Northwest. I keep a very few of the No. 30 and the Sharpless, in order to let my friends know that I can grow some large berries.

The Kentucky has done the best of any of the late varieties with me. It is a fair bearer, and the fruit of good quality. For a late berry I like it better than the Glendale.

Captain Jack, Red Jacket, Prouty, Duncan, and possibly some others, have borne with me about one-half of what the Wilson would have done under the same circumstances. I have tried many varieties that were utterly worthless.

For table berries to be used in the home families, I know of nothing better than Burr's New Pine and Downer's Prolific. They are both moderate in size, moderate bearers, and too soft for market, but very choice in quality. Within the last twenty-five years I have picked ripe berries twice upon the 6th of June. Twice it has been the 25th of June when we picked our first ripe fruit.

From the 10th to the 13th we generally get our first ripe fruit. Upon some of the cold highlands about Lake Superior they do not ripen until nearly one month later than in Central and Southern Wisconsin.

The season generally lasts about four weeks, and until about the commencement of the raspberry season. Last season we had our last dish of strawberries and our first dish of raspberries upon the table at the same time. I employ all of my pickers by the day. Each one has two boxes.

Into one of them is placed all the nice merchantable fruit, and in the other the imperfect berries are put.

The last named are sold at home for what they will bring. The others are of course retained for market.

In advocating spring cultivation as I have done, I well know that I am going against the opinions of some of our large and successful cultivators. In my own defense allow me to say this much: I would not and do not cultivate sufficiently deep to injure the roots of the growing plants. If your lands or strawberry beds were as rich as I make mine, you must of necessity either cultivate in the spring or lose your crop. These are facts from which there is no escape.

It may be asked then, why make the land so very rich? My answer is as follows: My long experience has taught me this. Other things being equal, the richer the land the larger the crop.

The Crescent Seedling may be an exception to this rule. But I can think of no other.

It is often said that the Wilson is failing. I can see no indications of it in the district of country from which I come. On the contrary, I think that the finest and most promising beds of them that I have seen were within the last six months.

Gentlemen, I have thus given you my own views and experience, rather than that of others, not because I wish to boast of what I have done or can do, but simply because my methods have been successful. I have failed but once in more than twenty years to have at least a paying crop, and most of the time they have been not only very large, but very profitable. I believe that I may say, and will only state it because I know it to be a fact, that I have never known any one whose crops have been so uniformly large as my

own.

These large crops have by no means been the result of chance or haphazard cultivation, but of very rich land, well drained, heavily manured, thoroughly cultivated, well protected during the winter, surface manured in the spring, and well watered if dry weather came on during the bearing

season.

What I have done you may do, provided it is better than the system you are at present pursuing. If it is not, you will, of course, not adopt it.

I make no pretense of having reached perfection, but on the contrary, if I live a few years longer, expect to far outdo anything that I have ever yet done. I do not pretend to know where the limit beyond which we can not pass is, or when it will be reached. But to reach it is an object worthy of our care, our thought, ard of our most worthy efforts.

He who wins in this friendly contest will hold a high and an honorable position.

Those who fail to reach the highest point will still have the satisfaction of knowing that they are engaged in a contest that brings no sorrows in its train; but upon the contrary all its tendencies are to elevate and lift up his fellow beings to a higher ideal of home life, and to make homes better and happier, as far as its influence shall reach.

At the conclusion of Mr. Smith's paper the President introduced Dr. H. E. McKay, of Madison, Miss., the President of the State Horticultural Society of that State, who is one of the largest strawberry growers of the entire valley, who read a paper;

STRAWBERRY CULTURE IN THE SOUTH.

BY DR. H. E. M'KAY.

At the request of our worthy President I consented to write a paper, to be read at this meeting, on strawberry culture in the South. In doing so I am most conscious of the fact that I can only present to you a few of the facts and fundamental points upon which the successful culture in the South is based. I am not by any means a "knight of the quill." I have only taken my pen occasionally when circumstances and the necessity of the case seem to demand that I should say something. I have endeavored, so far as possible, to cover the leading points in this paper, and such as we have I will read to you as well as I can. This occasion is very embarrassing to one unaccustomed to either writing or reading for the public, and I hope you will indulge me under these circumstances as kindly as you can.

We do not understand from the above heading that we are limited to the preparation of the land, manner of setting out the plants, and its after cultivation, but all the items necessary to the attainment of successful production are embraced.

With this view, we shall first refer to the different soils upon which it is or may be grown, for both home and commercial use.

Probably no section of our great country, whether we consider the far East, the great and inexhaustible middle belt, or the grand and almost unlimited Northwest, has greater diversity of soils than are to be found in the South; yet, notwithstanding this diversity, if there are places where other