In the Garden
Many of those who grow strawberries for pleasure or profit will, I think, agree with a farmer correspondent of mine—he is incidentally ninety years old and so of some experience—that the later the variety the better' and for this reason he deplores the absence of " British Queen," which remains perhaps the British Queen. It may be a month later than, for example, " Royal Sovereign," and is hardly ever touched by frost when other varieties are blacked out. Such is an Essex experience, among others. Yet the variety has been allowed almost to disappear. To quote a professional grower : "I have tried vainly to get some Queens since I came here ; the last reply I had was a laconic ' No British Queens. They are extinct.' " Are they? If so, " it is but hadn't ought to be." The only reason for their disappearance is the absurd, almost suicidal, aestheticism of the great British public. It has destroyed the flavour of bread by demanding it bleached and the flavour of cider by demanding it clear. British Queen is a pink berry, often with a green tip ; and though more agreeable to the palate has been quite knocked out by' berries of a uniform crimson. Such is the
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