348 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



roots at least 50 feet in diameter. Such a circle has more than a hundred and 

 fifty times the surface of a circle only four feet in diameter. Is it probable 

 that the very small quantity of iron rendered soluble in that small circle of 

 large, hard-barked roots, controlled that great circle of fibres 50 feet in 

 diameter, so as to change the small, black, cracked fruit, into "pears of great 

 and unusual size," which we are informed took the first premium at the 

 county fair? 



Experiments have not yet established the position that iron is a specific for 

 the cracking of the pear. We have had many trees of the White Doyenne, 

 Flemish Beauty, and other sorts liable to crack, growing in a soil noted for its 

 adaptness to pear culture. For many years the crops were smooth, fair, and 

 excellent; then cracking began and grew worse, till the fruit became worth- 

 less. The iron theorists were promptly ready with their explanation, — "the 

 roots had exhausted the iron from the soil ! " But they did not take into con- 

 sideration the fact that the roots were annually extending their circle into new 

 and fresh soil where no roots had been before. Not much of the theory was 

 left, when a few years afterwards the pears on all these trees ceased to crack, 

 and became smooth and fair again, no application of iron having been made to 

 them at any time, before or afterwards. The soil had naturally a very minute 

 portion of iron, and in this soil the trees were planted, and they continued to 

 grow with about equal vigor each year, bearing fine, fair fruit at one time, poor 

 and scabby specimens at another, and smooth and excellent fruit again, with- 

 out any change in treatment. AVe do not assert that iron never exerts a bene- 

 ficial influence, but so far the proof appears to be quite insufficient, and the 

 successful cases cited were probably accidental coincidences. — Country Gentle- 

 man. 



PEACHES. 



WHO ARE TO TEST THE NEW VARIETIES ? 



President Lyon, after mentioning some of the new varieties and their origin, 

 thus remarks : 



It is a somewhat significant fact that among all those new varieties, not one 

 is to be found hailing from the peach-growing regions. At least no name of a 

 prominent market grower is associated with the originating or introducing of 

 any one of them. In fact, so far as our own observation extends, very few if 

 any of our commercial growers, who may be supposed to be more directly 

 interested in the early determination of their actual value, either trouble them- 

 selves to inquire out their peculiarities, or to plant even a single tree with the 

 purpose of testing their value, with reference to using the variety, should it be 

 found profitable to do so. It is even true, so far as we are able to discover, 

 that, as a rule, the least possible amount of pomological improvement may be 

 expected to emanate from the commercial branch of this specialty — they usu- 

 ally contenting themselves with watching the self-sacrificing efforts of others, 

 in readiness to take the best possible advantage of their demonstrations. 



The amateur peach grower, therefore, who is, of all others, most likely to be 



