[Illustration:  C. A. Pfeiffer, Winona.]

The following year, 1898, I bought twenty-five trees from Mr. Lord and planted them late in March, on very sandy land on a southerly slope, pruning the trees back almost to a stump.  These trees were very slow in getting started but made a satisfactory growth before the season was over.  They commenced to bear the third year after planting, and are still producing good crops, but it is my more recent experience with this variety that finally induced me to prepare this article.  In the spring of 1909, we set out 160 plum trees, on rich, black, loamy soil on low land, nineteen of them being Surprise, the other varieties being, according to numbers, Terry, Ocheeda, Stoddard, Hawkeye, Bursota, Wolf, Omaha also a few Jewell, DeSoto, Forest Garden, American and Stella.  The Surprise trees bore a crop in 1913, again in 1914, and 1915, making it to the present time not only the most productive but the most profitable variety on our place.  While we did not keep an accurate record of the exact yield in 1913 and 1914, some of the trees produced fully five 16 quart cases in 1913.  A fair average would perhaps be about four cases per tree.  In 1914 the crop was somewhat lighter, yielding an average of three cases per tree.  This year we picked and sold eighty-five cases, which brought us a gross revenue of $79.60.  We lost part of the crop on account of continual rain in the picking season, or we would have had fully 100 cases.  Nine of the trees being in a more sheltered location than the other ten held their fruit better during the growing season, and produced a relatively heavier crop than the ten that were exposed to our fierce winds all summer.

We have never been able to supply the demand for them, at good prices, while other varieties went begging at any kind of a price.  Among their good qualities with us are productiveness, good size, extra fine quality and attractive color.  They are delicious to eat out of hand just as they are ripe enough to drop from the tree.  They are fine for canning, preserving or jelly.  They are practically curculio proof, and have never been affected with brown rot as have some other varieties.  Aphis never bothers them, while Terry and some other varieties nearly had the whole crop ruined by this pest in 1914.  The branches form good, strong shoulders at the trunk and do not split or break down in heavy storms or under their heavy loads of fruit, as the Terry and Forest Garden do.  The flower buds and fruit form as freely on the new growth as on the old spurs.  The crop is therefore about evenly distributed all over the tree, and while we picked almost eight cases from one tree this year it did not appear to be overloaded, as some varieties frequently are, the Surprise tree always being capable of maturing all the fruit that sets.

We have shipped them 300 miles by freight with perfect success, but we pick them from the tree before fully ripe.  If allowed to ripen on the tree they drop badly, which bruises and damages them.  The trees are thrifty, vigorous growers with beautiful glossy foliage that can be distinguished from all other varieties.