None of our small fruits are more esteemed, or more easily raised, and yet none more frequently fails. Failures always result from carelessness, or the want of a little knowledge of the best methods of cultivation. We omit much that might be said of the history and uses of the strawberry, and confine ourselves to a few brief directions, which, if strictly followed, will render every cultivator uniformly successful. No one need ever fail of growing a good crop of strawberries. In 1857, we saw plats of strawberries in Illinois, in the cultivation of which much money had been expended, and which were remarkably promising when in blossom, but which did not yield the cultivators five dollars' worth of fruit. In the language of the proprietors, "they blasted." Strawberries never blast; but, for the want of fertilizers at suitable distances, they may not fill. There are but three causes of failure--want of fertilizers, excessive drought, and allowing the vines to become too thick. Of most of our best varieties, the blossoms are of two kinds--pistillate and staminate, or male and female--and they are essential to each other. The pistillate plants bear the fruit, and the staminates are the fertilizers, without which the pistillates will be fruitless. There are three kinds of blossom--pistillate, staminate, and perfect, as seen in the cut. [Illustration: 1. Perfect blossom. 2. Staminate blossom. 3. Pistillate blossom.] The first (1) is perfect; that is, has both the stamens and pistils well developed: this will produce a fair crop of fruit, without the presence of any other variety. The second (2) has the stamens large, while the pistils (the apparently small green strawberry in the centre) are not sufficiently developed to produce fruit: such plants seldom bear more than a few imperfectly-formed berries. The third (3) has pistils in abundance, but is destitute of stamens, and hence, will not bear alone. The two latter are to be placed near each other, to render them productive; they may be readily distinguished when in blossom. It is always safe to cultivate the hermaphrodite plants; that is, those producing perfect blossoms; but the pistillates and staminates, in due proportions, produce the largest crops, and finer fruit. _Soil._--Much has been said against high fertilization with animal manures, and in favor of vegetable mould only. We feel entirely satisfied that the largest crops of strawberries are grown on land highly manured with common barnyard manure. To plant and manure a strawberry-bed, begin on one side, and dig a trench eighteen inches deep (from two to three feet is much better) and as wide; put six inches of common manure in the bottom; dig another trench as deep, and place the soil upon the manure in the first trench; fill the last with manure as the first, and so on over the whole plat. Manure the surface lightly with very fine manure and wood-ashes.