Improvement of Edible Fruits. 267 



that it (as well as the effects of it) was known eighteen hundred 

 years back : — witness what St. Paul has written in the eleventh 

 chapter of his Epistle to the Romans ; from which passage, it 

 is to the English reader, evident that something like grafting 

 was known in his days. I am, however, not aware of the strict 

 meaning of the Greek verb used by the Apostle in this passage, 

 and which is rendered "grafting," by our translators. But 

 however this may be, is a point of no importance in the present 

 detail ; the art itself is one of the most useful operations in the 

 management of trees, not only to perpetuate the most approved 

 kinds of fruit for a long series of years, but is also productive of 

 great advantages in the right adaptation of the stock and graft, 

 and by which they can be made to counteract the exuberances 

 of each other. 



Another remarkable process of improving fruits has occurred 

 to cultivators, since the discovery of the sexual system of plants 

 by the celebrated Linnseus. — That there existed such a thing as 

 sex in the vegetable kingdom, was known, or rather apprehended 

 before his time, is sufficiently evident from the writings of na- 

 turalists ; but it remained for his eminently scrutinizing mind to 

 confirm and illustrate "this curious fact, in the economy of nature. 

 On this, he arranged his system and classification of plants ; 

 and though it be a more artificial (and too homely, perhaps) 

 mode of distinction than that of some other botanists, and is, 

 consequently, rather giving way to the more natural arrange- 

 ment of Jussieu ; yet the leading fact of Linnseus's system is 

 so far proved, and taken advantage of by improvers, that many 

 valuable varieties of new fruits have been obtained, by simply 

 impregnating the female parts of one kind with the farina of 

 another ; thus producing a new progeny, which is neither one 

 or other, though partaking of the qualities of both. 



It is astonishing how far this means of improvement and 

 fertilization has already been carried, and inconceivable how 

 extensively it may be exercised in the farther amelioration of 

 fruits ; — the prospect is boundless, and future generations only, 

 will witness the consequences of this easy and certain method 

 of improvement ! To the silent and unheeded operation of this 

 circumstance, whatever may have been the agents, we are 

 doubtless indebted for many varieties^ which have been found 



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