logical statement, we may follow up with a triumph, but not one won by reason over the emotions. The victor here must bear himself as the vanquished, till the new truths have wrought gradually their results on the sentiments. A discreet war, therefore, may be opened on the follies of dress without adopting a garb, serviceable and defensible in itself, but so far without the pale of custom as to be intolerable to the mass of persons. We need not provoke the rabble, nor gather the mob in our enunciation of the secondary truths of life, giving them such a form that they cannot but be scorned by the short-sighted, squint-eyed proselytes of usage. It is sufficient if we hold fast and slowly enlarge all that is beautiful and serviceable in fashion.

We can now take but little pleasure in anything sensible in dress because we know it came without reason and will depart without reason; that it is but an accidental combination of fortuitous forces, and has no real significance as indicating any return to sober thought; nay, that it is a new instance in which fashion is making ready to jilt and mock us in our credulous good-will, to buffet common sense anew, and put it to open shame.

Against irrational tendencies, we shall make easiest headway, as in a crowd. Violence thrusts aside but a few, and soon arms all against us, while a slight, presistent pressure steadily carries us in any direction. With wedged shoulder, and body bent forward, let us stand ready to part, in behalf of ease, comfort and character, that social mob which now sways here and there, where their eyes carry them.

A FARMER'S ORCHARD.

BY J. C. PLUMB, MILTON.

(Prepared for the State Agricultural Convention.)

PRESENT CONDITION.

An eastern man traveling in the West remarked two things as especially noteworthy: the broad fields and the meagre orchards, the wide area of land in fine condition for the most approved laborsaving machinery, with less waste from hem, hedgerow, rock, hil

lock, or gulch than he sees in his eastern range. But the raggededged corner, with its vacant, lonesome-looking trees that we call orchards, are in strong contrast with the general thrift and fullness apparent in most other things that go to make the sum of good living in this land of plenty.

Every lover of progress and perfection in the art of horticulture must be pained to witness the evidences of our very imperfect knowledge of the wants of the fruit-tree, and the apathy of the farmers with respect to the condition of their orchards. Thoughts like these come to me always in my travels around the state, and I confess to a feeling of humiliation that these things are so within the counties where most of the thirty years of my toil and study in the field of horticulture have been spent, and that so little of certainty and permanency has been attained by the fruit-growing interests of that region.

I am aware that our first notions of fruit-culture were largely upon a false basis, and we have had to grow out of them by the slow teaching of painful and costly experience. But is it not now time. to awake from the lethargy and discouragements of the past, and bring up our fruit-growing interest to the status its importance in domestic economy demands?

The causes which have led to this condition of our orchards are various, and not within the province of this paper to enumerate and describe in detail. I will only refer to some of the more prominent of them. If I were to ask the farmers present for their reasons for the condition of their orchards, they would answer about in the following order:

CAUSES.

1. Some of my trees were dead when received; or their vitality much impaired by long exposure.

2. They started well, but succumbed to the mid-summer drouth. 3. Were winter-killed.

4. Were spring-killed.

5. Destroyed by insects or vermin.

6. Injured by farm-stock.

7. Over-fed, or starved.

If there be any other cause, it may be exhaustion or old age, which I think is about as rare as Methuselah's nowadays.

Any one of these causes is enough to decimate an orchard, and with all combined, no wonder the present unhealthy condition. But even this array of evils should not discourage us, for while common to all they do not, fortunately, all appear at the same time, and the means are in our hands of resisting them all successfully.

REVIEW AND REMEDIES.

I will review them briefly in the order named.

Procure your trees as near home as is consistent and of parties that you can trust in three particulars, viz.: Their honesty, their judgment, and their promptness to execute your orders; or in a word, reliable. There is often a culpable want of care in the handling of trees before packing, but not less to blame is the farmer who will needlessly expose his trees to the sun, wind, and frost for hours after receiving them from the nursery or tree-box. Every buyer should be prepared to thoroughly protect his trees, root and branch, from injury after he receives them, and never forget that it was the last straw that broke the camels back."

The inevitable exposure of digging, packing, and transportation are matters of great solicitude to the nurseryman, and the farmer should do his part well, and with as much care.

I speak from long experience when I say that we exercise more care for the stock we send out than for that we retain for our own planting.

MULCH FOR DROUGHT.

A tree should never be planted out until it is in growing condition. If not fresh and sappy, they should be restored by burying in fresh soil, root and branch, for a week, or with root in moist soil and tops heavily shaded and ocasionally showered, they will be much more likely to grow when planted out, especially if planted during a moist spell. A heavy mulch immediately after planting will do much to restore trees, and will if retained through the summer dispose of the second-named cause, midsummer drought.

If applied early it will retain abundant moisture for the driest time. Thousands of trees, every other way right, are allowed to dry out after they have made a fair start, for the want of this early spring mulch. This is now so generally understood and appreciated, that no sympathy is felt for the planter who fails to comply with this simple requirement.

WINTER-KILLING.

Winter-killing is particularly a western affection-like the ague. Technically, it is a rupture of the cellular structure of the plant by the expansion of its fluids from extreme and sudden cold. Practically, it results from four causes, namely: Too much and prolonged growth in autumn; soil too rich in plant-food; want of constitutional hardiness to resist the fourth-undue freezing. The remedy is plain. We must adapt the growth of the tree to its internal and external conditions. We must secure a growth of wood so well matured and of such constitutional make, that it will endure the shock of winter changes.

SPRING-KILLING.

Spring-killing is generally confined to the root. A severe shock of frost after the sap flows in spring, may destroy the young shoots, or even the whole tree, but such cases are very rare, for the tree that can endure the first shock of winter will generally go through the changes of spring safely. The frosts of May and June may nip the young shoots, but there are plenty of dormant buds to reproduce the foliage destroyed, hence such frosts do not cause death, unless from previous injury or loss of roots the reproducing power is exhausted.

ROOT-KILLING.

Root-killing in early spring is one of the most common forms of injury to which our trees are subject. It arises from the lack of moisture in the soil during the winter or at the time of the spring thaws. Roots in such surroundings will not endure successive freezing and thawing as if they were in a moist soil. Hence it should be a fixed rule, that all trees should have an abundance of moisture in their soil at the beginning of winter.

During the months of October and November, the surface should be made loose and open to all the rain-falls. No animals should be allowed to compact the soil by herding or pasturing in the orchard during these months. Here is one of the most common errors of the farmer orchardist. For the few dollars worth of fodder you thus secure, you pay the price of a weakened root-power or a total loss of some trees, which were every other way full of promise for long usefulness.

WINTER MULCH.

If from a short rain-fall in autumn, the tree soil is not well saturated, then you surely need this natural mulch of vegetation to insure your trees against this root-killing. A heavy winter mulch is the only absolute safety in this matter. This will retain the frost until it is removed by the warm spring showers.— This is especially necessary in southern Wisconsin, as we are below the uniform snow-lines, and yet we have the extreme and prolonged cold of winter, the frost remaining a solid mass, at ten to twenty inches depth, while the surface may be dried out by the warm sun and south winds of March. This snow-line spoken of is the point where the snow falls early, and remains through the winter until the spring rains. It varies with the seasons, sometimes extending below the south line of the state, and almost uniformally to the latitude of Portage, and the lines of the Wisconsin River below that point. Hence, root-killing is the most prevailing effect of winter below that line, while it may be almost unknown above that line, but top-killing will be the more common, especially on the richer soils which produce a late growth of wood.

INSECTS AND VERMIN.

Here opens a wide and inexhaustible field of observation and research, and one well traversed by but few of the most studious and observing. It is one to which lives of toil have been given, and on which volumes have been written, and to any, whose task and time will admit, I commend these works as worthy of careful study, and the field as one rich in good to our race. But its paths are intricate, often very obscure, and no especial halo of glory lightens the plodding way of the entomologist.

But as the name Agassiz inspires enthusiasm in the student of zoology, so may the memory of a Walsh, and the labors of Fitch, Riley and Le Baron be better appreciated and similar laudable efforts be encouraged by substantial aid from the state. We need to know more of the habits of the insects that prey upon our fruits and other products of the farm. Entomology is to-day one of the substantial departments of natural history, but its study is a labor which requires the time and careful investigation of the best minds, and we trust the time is not far distant when the farmers of the West will see it for their interest to encourage such efforts by rewards in some way commensurate with the value of this labor.