J3EE 2L.”

Ii-

NEWSY Nora's

BY AGIIOOLA

BLOSSOM-END nor or‘ TOMATOES

The following abstract of an article in the quarterly magazine "F3115 Research", will provide my "mgr; with further light on this

n-gus physiological trouble. Ac- comm; to the author Mr. Chas. B. Bu", blossom-end rot occurs when wmato plants “fail to re- ceivc an adequate or uniform sup-

y o; moisture." when this hap- pen,’ transpiration still goes on but moisture is taken from the de- veloplng fruits to meet it; with the result that the cells at the blossom-end of the fruit collapse, Ind a dark brown or black area Mm, often aggravated by fun- pld parasites.

y; the first part of the growing ugson has been unusually wet, a mppy growth is made, and the tis- lue of the fruit is soft and suc- culent. Under such conditions the fruit is very susceptible to the rot. md 1g g dry period sets in. there ls almost certain to be heavy losses.

B11936 (in New York State) the rainfall for April. May, June and July was below the average, the lotsl being 6.26 inches. During April. Mal’ and June, 1937, the nmfall was above the average, bggn more than twice the rain- fall for the four-month's per- iod of the previous year. Then (ollowed a. dry period in July and Aumlst, and as a result the "rot" n; very severe in 1937 as com- pared with 1936.

Now comes a. paragraph with which I am quite in accord. "Prun- ing and tying up tomato plants on stalks or trellises tends to in- flu“ the amount of blossom-end mt," There is a greater trans- piration from stalked plants, which also have a smaller root-system u; support it. The unpruned, un- qgined planks, lying fiat, shade the soil and reduce the rate of evaporation, so conserving the moisture. Anything which will help the moisture-holding capacity 4 the soil, such as the if clusion .01 organic matter, will, Mr. Sayfe thinks, tend to reduce the rot. iieavy fertilization, the largest plant-growth, resulted _iri the greatest loss. A further control is by irrigating during dry

spells. ‘rnis seems to agree with my can observations, but a relative

who sometimes d‘ these matters, suggests that I have f‘ tomatoes too long in one

ace." and that if I try new soil next year I may have better luck. lwonder? It will be worth while snaking a trial planting any how. lave insects any relation to the touble? ‘mere is much to be denied up before the last word on the subject is said.

I1 -‘ mono runrnnsr 'i ‘Hie Nature Magazine for Sep- tember has a splendid article on ilie Purple Loosestrife. Lythrum lalicaria. It is understood to be the "long purples" oi shake- apoarek "Hamlet." though I have frequently heard the Purple Orchis (O. mascula) mentioned in this connection. The Ioosestrife is an island plant, having been found at an unnamed locality by Prof. Groh in i926, and later by Prof. P. R. Hurst at West Point. It is comparatively new to this con- tinent: "less than sixty years ago Asa Gray described it as still "sparingly wild" in New Elillfllld Where it first appeared." Twenty years ago it was unknown in Michigan. the roadside flowers be-

by producing _

mad over Lythrum: I believe it is I Band case of trimcrphisml have every one of the eighteen pollinations possible. For the love of Heaven, examine your species ""3 u 37°“ c"! Bet me some seed. do!" The trimorphism alluded to means three forms" and they m. elude flowers with long, medium, or short styles; long, medium_ or short stamens; and large green, medium yellow, or small yellow pollen grains. Sir Joseph D. Hook- el’. however. says that these admit of nine modes of cross-fertiliza- tion, which I imofllne to be a bettcr estimate than Darwin's.

"There are today only two known examples of such exquisite- ly adjusted functioning as "tri- inorphisml" says the article. it does not icll us the name of the other plant.

e-e

REMINISCENCES 0F LONDON

London has clearly defined areas which are devoted to (l) national administration or government; (2) entertainment. and i3) legal mat- ters. From the Houses of Parlia- ment to Charing Cross the visitor notos the Home Office with its vis-a-vis the famous "Scotland yard"; Horse Guards, Admiralty, War Office, and many other gov- ernment departments. North of Trafalgar Square, there is a region of theatres extending Drury Lane. The clustering oi these places of entertainment has this advantage: when, as often happens ii a good play is presented, the “house is full." the disappointed late-comers are within easy dis- tance of another playhouse. So well is this appreciated that the Cinemas, I notice have mostly opened up in this area. The third area which I have specified, fol- lows close on to the second; and from Somerset House (where are stored all the national documents connected with “Births. Merriam and Deaths" — and the Temple. both fronting on the Thames. there is a. district extending north to Gray's Inn, which is sacred to the Lord Chancellor and his sub- ordinates!

Now I had often promised my- self a visit to the Savory Theatre if I ever got to London again, and it was not hard to persuade my companion to visit the “home of the Gilbert and Sullivan Here we made our first acquain- tance wlth the cue (or properly queue) system. On going to the play at the Newcastle Theatres o! that day, the first comers stood near the door, and formed a little, crowd. which grew and grew with later accessions. when the doors were opened the first-comers were literally carried in by the rush from behind, and had enough t0 do to keep their footing. In Ion- don we found the play-goers lined up in single file quietly awaiting their turn to enter. Even in the queue the folk had some entertain- ment, for an "impersonater" stood in the roadway and gave an out- door performance. His apparatus was only a small square of felt with a round hole cut in it, but he made the most of it. He twist- ed it into a cocked hat, put it on. altered his features to a low- ering gloom. folded his arms and announced "Napoleon!" He was a" Spanish bandit, an lmxlish D81‘- son. and a dozen other characters- At last he passed the hat - the real one-for the pence. and then went off to some other queue. We found at every theatre itinerant entertainers of all kin , conjurers.

ing goldenrod (our "yellow-weed"). rnilkweed, and an umbelllfer called Queen Anne's lace. Now “every marsh and pondbank from Mus- kegon to Detroit glows with a mid- summer show of rosy-purple spikes that in places cover thirty or forty acres. The dominant color of the season has changed from yellow to warm magenta."

With the plant has grown a host if Popular names. amongst which I notc" spiked loosestrife", “dead man's fingers," “soldiersfl, "willow- hemxsfl, "rainbow-weed” and "red Bally" the last being the favorite kl Michigan.

This looeestrife desirable cut flower. and in tiir‘! "Flower Show School." an exten- lllln project of Michigan State College. bearing some resemblance lo our Central School Fair, it was found that more than half the competitors

cultivated flowers."

i

.-.

fbably was of foreign descent; at makes a very ,

had employed "red yege, because it was takinfl 5W“? 3111?" in their arrangements — part of his profits. At the close “the only wilding among fifty of a stormy interview with his

Red Sally has another and B were (renter claim to notice. This plant threw up the partnershlP- The" led Charles Darwin, the ‘great na- was the more suns in ill" W‘ iurallst, to one of his most brii- cause Sir Arthur's mother 0r 8mm‘ "Int discoveries. He wrote to Asa mother (I forget which) was an u"! "I am almost stark, staring Italian of a very 90°!‘ "m"!

Blackbird Bandolier of rm- foa- mma mum. we"

acrobats, etc. The queue system was adopted in Newcastle W0 0T three years later.

Inside the theatre the first thing we noticed was its smallness com- pared with the theatres in New- castle, but the lavish style of its decoration was such as we had never seen. It was the expense of this furniture that finally broke up the partnership oi the famous librettist and the not less famous musiclan.— William Schweake Gil- bert, and Sir Arthur seymour Sul- livan. Doyley Curie was proprie- tor of the Savoy Theatre. and Dm-

any rate he believed in a rather Oriental display which made good advertising at that date. He. won Sullivan's consent to lllll-lllw val" pet in the corridors. it is said. at the cost of £100. Gilbert when l"? heard oi this, flew into a towerinl

two partners ho told them they "(Sanguinafyl Jews" and

Ilium: ‘

T0 ESTABLISH NEW REBURI]

Market Classes to Provide the Best Competition.

FEEDER CATTLE

Western Cattle Purchased in Maritnnes to be Shown.

There will be a record display of beef cattle in the market classes to be shown at the Maritime winter Fair this year, according u; w, a, Trucman of A0184!- who stated that nearly one hundred market cattle would be entered from the Aulac and Westmoreland Point district alone. Harold Carter, Ed Ander- son, George H101“. Wells Bros, Harold Etter and others-all well known exhibitors in other years, would have big entries in the market classes in addition to their usual display of prizes stock in shorhorn, Hereford and Grade classes.

Feeder cattle brought here from Western Canada will be on display, and the general public will take an active interest in these animals. Only recently Messrs. Harold Carter and George Hicks, purch- ased six carloads in Western Can- ada-each taking two cars, while one car will be consigned ‘to Colpitt Bros, of Albert County. The sixth car is- on order, and the animals will be purchased by fann- ers in the march districts.

While these recent shipments will not be fitted in time for display at the Maritime Winter Fair, opening on November 5th, pure bred cattle that were purchased last year have been held over and will be included in the entered herds. These will comprise Shorthorns and Here- fords.

Actually tho beef entry will be One 0f the largest in the history of the Fall shows-and aside from the Royal Winter Fair at Toronto, will be the largest beef alas ever displayed in Canada.

The dairy classes are filling rapidly as well, while the number of horses to be show-n this year will be larger than usual.

-1_____i_a-__ __

"But never either found another". as the poet says. to captivate the fancy of Englishmen as these two did.

On that visit. I remember, the theatre was lighted by gas, which was not the best illuminant on a warm summer's night. Doyley Carte afterwards put in the elec- tric light, but it was not depend- able at the outset, and be left the gas-fittings in for a year or two. "Just in case." After the lapse ~f so many years I am not just sure whether the opera was “Trial by Jury" or the ever-popular "Mikado" but I recollect that the scenery and the orchestra were much superior to those of Doyley Carte's travel- ling company that toured the pro- vinces (or counties); while the actors and actresses performed and sang in a sort of blase fashion that would have utterly damned them in Newcastle. The touring company was "all alive, ohl" from start to finish.

London theatres went in inter, and casne out later, then those in the North. When we emerged it

cd as at midday, and almost as bright. The public-houses (saloons) were open till midnight as against ii p.m. in Newcastle, and lo p.m. in rural Northumberland. Mat-

was to find the streets as crowd- |

'l‘l-li£ _ LJHARLOTTE’

ruwm fiUAKUiAN

CONSER

A WEEKLY COLUMN OI‘ PRACTICAL OPINIONS 0N VITAL ISSUES AFFECTING TEE USES AND ABUIII OI NATURAL IESOUIBI! I!

IIAISIIIIBLD-

VA TI ON

III- LUDIDW IINIINS.

SPORT CONTRDL

love of Nature is an evidence of civilization; it is hardly found among savages or primitive peo- ple at all. it is the most modern of all virtues and reflnements- its morality Ls unimpeachable for it is concerned with truth in op- position to sentiment and sup- erstition. While there were among the ancients individuals who were at trac ted to the study of the, creatures and plants around them, they were always an inconsiderable minority. The anci- ent. world at its best was little concerned with animals, their lives. loves or sufferings. Christianity has not much to say about our duty towards animals and we may wonder why, {or surely the dogs and donkeys of Jerusalem were no better treatcd two thousand years ago than they are today. For two thousand; years the simple sup- position that ahimais were created so'eiy for our use has Bone almost unchallenged. Natural History hardly became a matter of serious study until the Victorian era.

The earliest printed natural his- tory books reveal how little was know of the animal creation. Until Gilbert White wrote his Natural History of Seiborne and the Reverend J. G. Wood dilated up- On i-he Common Objects of the Country and Seashore. natural his- tory books, with fcw exceptions. were more like moral hand-laooks, which told how the cow was given us to provide breakfast for good children, and the lion a sad ex- ample of how the babe should not behave —before company at least. And how times have changed since William Blake wrote his sympa- thetic poem. "To a. Fly," and good children were exhorted not to kill

the pretty things which danced their little hour in God's sunlight! so happily

Now we organize “swat the fly" cempaignsi for we know, but only since Pasteurs time. that the fly walks in unclean places and does not wipe its feet enough before it settles on baby's milk bottle. And. even now. we provide these unclean places. ~

It took us many. many centuries to develop a Society for the Pre- vention of Cruelty to Animals, and even now kindness to animals is considered by many an unimport- ant by-product of civilized edu- cation. What is our duty towards our neighbor on four feet? How should we regard our little bro- the: in fur or feathers? There still exist human beings who are amused by the antic struggles of a tortured animal— they're only axiimals; what docs it matter? ‘There are still men who feel much the some way about ' savages, At the same timethene is hardly an educated man in this country who would not vigorously oppose the maltreatment of any animal he saw being mistreated, although the same man will cheerfully take his gun when the season opens for sport. It, is right to kill one thing and wrong to kill another? And yet, is it quite a healthy state of mind to melt with sympathy for a wounded deer or dog and yet send our sons to the shambles of a modern battlefield?

The ethics of sport are still somewhat undefined. A great hunter once told me that he would feel ashamed to shoot rabbits and partridges because the animal had no chance. He shot big game only because. as he said, "if I miss the animal gets his chance." He never

ters never quietcned down till about 2 a.m., and by 5 am. the early civic employees "took up the | running." London very nearly turn- ed night inio day, but paid for its ' strenuous efforts-by the loss of its | people's stamina; so that families; rarely lasted beyond three gen-i erations. London grew, and is 5B1“ ' growing, because of its attracting the best of the population from the “shires.”

This was not the only visit to the Savoy: in subsequent trips to London I heard the “Pirates of Penzancc". the “Gondoliers” and the semi-classical “Yeomen of the Guard", my favorite a comic opera with a tragic conclusion! The "Pirates of Penzance" was once presented here. by local talent: how many Chariottetoniaim re- member that?

I have touched upon the public- houses of London in the above notes, and am now in r session of authentic information regard- ing those of the present day, sent me by a correspondent in that city. This, though not a re- miniscence, will doubtless interest my readers - but it must keep

m1, ontario, whole M IN

many times grand champion Angus bull

till next week.

also winning.

took more than one native with him, to carry an extra gun, and often enough he went entirely alone into the bush of somaliland. It is noteworthy that most great hunters give up sport as they grow older ;it is an evidence of a civilized soul one that has become civil through experi- enoe.

Man is a hunter born. In anci- ent times he kliled for food and thought little about sport or its ethics. His preoccupation was to bring home the dinner or go hungry, and. as in Africa. today. animals were "nyama" —mcat and nothing more. Sport is the result of applying menial msirictions to

the science of killing animals. It" over-shaded orchards or in those

creates right and wrong and should bestow some sense of dignity up- on what otherwise is only the indulgence of a primitive lust. Sport is the morality of slaughter, a quality which men almom suc- ceeded in introducing to warfare until the desire for efficiency

“The Crowning Fair of a Crowning Year”

MARITIME

WINTER

FAIR

and FOX SHOW

“i555, n. s. nov. 5-11

9 nonsn snow o VAUDEVILLE

e rues OF was , BANDS

, AMUSEMENTS

____-_1 Th e Greatest Winter Fair in the East.

. sign that indicates their presence

‘made results the solo eritcrion of right-

It may be that ‘Time will slowly eliminate sport as it is understood today. but however much we may wish for the conservation 0f wild- life, hating cruelty as men once hated heresy, we must face the fact that sport is held to be right and legitmatc in our time. Our ambition must therefore be to in- crease the civilized sentiment that there must be some quarter given to the quarryrthat because some of us have invented instruments of wholesale death. it is no reason why they should be used for sport or even profit. True sport keeps alive and regulates, at the same time, the hunting spirit without which the average man seems un- able io exist. There is something wrong about the person whose tendcr-heaxtdness becomes mand- lin: perhaps it is in exact ratio to the meaner man who is utterly in- different to animal suffering.

The rules of sport must be’ dictated by good sense. At least we should not kill more than we can use and it should be remembered that when the Government regu- lates the “bag" of a day, it con- cedes the maximum to the greed- iest of its citizens.

The game oi golf was defined by somebody as “the art of putting a very small ball into a very small hole with instruments totally un- fit for the purpose!’ But therein consists the sport, which is a con- test with difficulty. Bushes, cloth- ing and ‘the back of his neck are what one easiest for a beginner to catch with a fly rod, but a real angler would rather lure a trout with a bunch of feathers on-a hook than snare him with an angle- worm, which is far bettcr bait. Skill with a gun comes from being called upon suddenly to use it by the unexpected appearance of game. To kill half-tame. hand-fed birds, accustom ‘l to food in a farmer's yard, or when they are terrified and driven before the guns. is little more sport than to kill canariu with a hammer. What is difficult is to be desired; the skill eurphasize‘, and even some- thing risked, to make killing re- spectable by a civilized mind. Let us admit the savage in ourselves by cultivating his skill, for the man who can shoot a bird or a fish with a bow and arrow is still doing something which it is diffi- cult altogether to despise. 1t is too much to hope that sport will ever deign to be useful. If the sports- men must kill without control, it would be well if he would kill the enemies of the human race against which we have never been entirely successful. ‘The rat and the wolf will tax his ingenuity to the limit and there are other dangerous things to which he might pro- fitably direct his siaughtcrous in- tent, starlings in some places, Eng- lish sparrows in others -but there is no hope of that. The sportsman prefers something easier.