In the garden of one of the farm stations (Sande) I counted 70 fine bunches of red currants growing on six inches of one of the overladen down-hanging stems of a currant bush. Cherries are served for dessert by simply breaking off a small branch of the tree and bringing it to the table—the fruit almost as many as the leaves. This luxuriance I attribute to two causes. First, that in that part of Norway the winter breaks up suddenly at about the beginning of June, and not until then, when night frosts are no longer possible, do the blossoms appear. It was on the 24th August that I counted the 70 bunches of ripe currants. The second cause is the absence of sparrows and other destructive small birds that devour our currants for the seeds’ sake before they ripen, and our cherries immediately on ripening. These are preceded by the bullfinches that feed on the tender hearts of the buds of most of our fruit trees. Those who believe the newspaper myths which represent such thick-billed birds eating caterpillars, should make observations and experiments for themselves as I have done. In our canvas conservatories neither sparrows nor caterpillars, nor wasps, or other fruit-stealers will penetrate, nor will the spring frosts nip the blossoms that open out in April. All the conditions for full bearing are there fulfilled, and the ripening season, though not so intense, will be prolonged. We shall have an insular Jersey climate in London, where the mean temperature is higher than in the country around, and, if I am not quite deluded, we shall be able to grow the choicest Jersey pears, those that best ripen by hanging on the tree until the end of December, and fine peaches, which are commonly destroyed by putting forth their blossoms so early. All the hundred and one varieties of plums and damsons, greengages, etc., that can grow in temperate climates will be similarly protected from the frosts that kill their early blossoms, and the birds and the wasps that will not give them time to ripen slowly. I have little doubt that if my project is carried out, any London householder, whether rich or poor, may indulge in delicious desserts of rich fruit all grown on the sites of their own now dirty and desolate back-yards; that if prizes be given for the most prolific branches of cherry and plum trees, gooseberry and currant bushes, the gardens of the Seven-dials and of classic St. Giles’s may carry off some of the gold medals; and that, by judicious economy of space and proper pruning of the trees, the canvas conservatories may be made not only to serve as orchard houses, but also to grow the salads, kitchen herbs, and green vegetables for cookery, under the fruit trees or close around their stems.