Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 40.djvu/146

136 during the palmy days of the plantations the fields were not eroded, but that was because of the constant use of concentric cultivation, hillside ditches, balks, and other protective devices; but when the fields were abandoned the waters gathered on the hillsides, ran down the slopes, and quickly destroyed the surface. In many cases the destruction has gone so far that to check it would cost more than the value of the land; but when not too far advanced it may be checked by planting Bermuda grass on the steep slopes and locust trees about the heads of the gullies, and by other preventive measures.

The Travels of Weeds.—The term "weed" is a relative one, and, as defined by Prof. Byron D. Halsted, means "only plants that are able to assert their inborn rights above all others and wage a close warfare with man for the possession of the earth. There is nothing in structure, form, or substance that distinguishes a weed from other plants. It lives, grows, and reproduces its kind like all others of its class, and therefore the methods of migration are the same as obtain with those of its kin. The rapidity may be greater because of the dominant weed nature, but the difference is only in degree and not in kind." A large number of our worst weeds came to us from foreign countries; just how they emigrated will never be known in every case. "Some came as legitimate freight; many were stowaways. Some entered from border lands upon the wings of the wind, upon river bosoms, in the stomachs of migrating birds, clinging to the hair of passing animals, and a hundred other ways, besides by man himself. Into the New England soil and south along the Atlantic seaboard the weed seeds first took root. Also, there are wild plants of that region, with a strong weedy nature, developed into pests of the farm and garden. As civilized man moved westward the weeds followed him, reinforced by new native ones that soon vied with those of foreign blood. Not satisfied with this, the natives of the interior ran back upon the trail and became new enemies to the older parts of our land. The conditions for the development of weeds have increased with the development of our country, until now we are literally overrun. Weeds, usually as weeds, go and come in all directions, no less as tramps catching a ride upon each passing freight train than in cherished bouquets gathered by the wayside and tenderly cared for by transcontinental tourists in parlor cars."

The Scharf Library of Johns Hopkins.—The library presented by Colonel J. Thomas Scharf to Johns Hopkins University includes books, pamphlets of great value, and several hundred unpublished manuscripts. Most of the works are historical. The manuscripts include ten by James D. McCabe, formerly of the Confederate War Department; many on revolutionary history, and a large number of a miscellaneous character. Other departments consist of a collection of materials for the history of New York city and vicinity; a collection on early Missouri history; the most valuable of Thompson Westcott's books on Pennsylvania; materials on almost every phase of Maryland history, and more varied and complete materials for the history of Baltimore; a rich mass of documents on southern history, and covering the whole period of the rebellion; about three thousand "broadsides," covering many departments of Revolutionary history, and including specimens of almost every one written or printed in Maryland during the last and the early part of the present century; Confederate and Revolutionary autographs, with the letters to which they are attached, some of them interesting in themselves; and various miscellaneous articles.

Japanese Playing-cards.—The Japanese playing-cards are more distinctly original, according to Mrs. J. King Van Rensselaer, than any others, and show no marks of common origin with them. They are oblong, and are made of pasteboard, with the backs painted black. The designs seem to be stenciled, and are brightly and appropriately colored and then covered with an enamel or varnish, which makes them slippery. They are much smaller than our cards. Forty-nine in number, they are divided into twelve suits of four cards in each suit. One card is a trifle smaller than the rest of the pack, and has a plain white face, not embellished with any distinctive emblem, and is used as a "joker." The other cards are covered