Mr. Bateham sends us a private letter, evidently not intended for publication, but in which he says he is annoyed by parties writing to him about it, and he desires us to say to all without any further correspondence, that he regards it a first-class variety, superior in many respects to the Jucunda from which it may, perhaps, be a seedling. He gives the following account of its origin, which we think he will have no objection to our extracting: "The Sterling, -with several other seedling strawberries, was first exhibited to the public at a fruit and flower show at East Cleveland, in June 1870, when I was present, and in common with other fruit growers was very favorably impressed with this variety. I learned that it was grown from seed by Matthew Crawford, a market berry-grower of that place. The seeds taken from several large varieties, including Jucunda and Triomphe de Gand. About this time, Mr. F. R. Elliott had fruit of the Sterling presented to him, and wrote a flattering notice of it for the Rural New Yorker and the Cleveland Herald.