348 STATE nORTICULTUEAL SOCIETY. 



fertile soil insure a rapid growth of trees. When it comes to fruiting tiie case 

 is groatl}' altered. The extra drain on the soil to produce the fruit requires 

 additional manure, while the beating and washing rains make the soil too 

 compact and heavy, showing that more vegetable matter is needed. So the 

 man who aims to make fruit a specialty finds himself compelled to become a 

 farmer as well, at least so far as keeping stock and making manure is con- 

 cerned. If he thoroughly understands fruit growing it will probably give him 

 a larger profit than ordinary farming. "With this advantage he can, near large 

 cities, buy stable manure, or he can aflFord to buy western corn and other foods, 

 and thus increase the home-made supply of manure. 



It will thus be seen that as the growers of fruit need to become farmers to 

 insure the best success, it should follow that farmers who understand how to 

 grow fruits, ought to have an important advantage in the business. As a rule 

 the farm will keep its owner on fewer acres than he cultivates, and if he sets 

 aside a portion of his land for fruit growing, the income from this will be net 

 gain. But it is only farmers who have practical knowledge of the details of 

 the fruit growing business who can safely attempt this, and when they do so it 

 must be with the understanding that when the orchard and farm crops con- 

 flict, the orchard must take the precedence. 



A PERFECT APPLE TREE. 



H. 0. Hovey, in the Scientific American, gives an account of a perfect apple 

 tree, which we reproduce here to induce the reader to look about him and 

 ascertain how near this ideal he can find a specimen. 



The perfect apple tree, of which an account is here given, is a specimen of 

 the hearty, juicy, old-fashioned Vandeveer Pippin. It was selected with care 

 by my father in 1838, and transplanted to a sunny, sheltered spot, near his 

 home in Crawfordsville, Ind. The virgin forest had just been removed from 

 the fertile soil, amid which its roots were placed ; and throughout its career it 

 has been plentifully watered by the overflow from two ample roofs. 



The law of spiral growth, so often distorted, has been beautifully wrought 

 out in this individual tree. The reader is probably aware that the leaves on 

 every tree follow a definite arrangement on the stem. The plan is highly com- 

 plex in pines and and cedars, but simple in the apple tree. Fasten a thread to 

 a leaf and pass it from one to another, in the same direction, and it will go 

 twice around the stem before reaching a leaf situated exactly above the first. 

 The divergence of the second leaf from the first is 144°, or two-fifths of a cir- 

 cle ; there is the same distance between the second and third, and so on to the 

 sixth, which is directly above the first. This is what is known as the generat- 

 ing spiral. 



The leaf is the builder of the tree. It hangs out its inch or two of oval 

 green in the air for breath and sunshine, and drinks in the dew and the rain, 

 conveying the result of its vegetable chemistry to a permanent place in the 

 substance of the tree. From the heart of each leaf a cord goes into the fiber 

 of the wood which is only a binding and knitting together of many leaf-cords, 

 and when the leaves shrivel and fall, these conls remain as their monuments. 

 As Ivuskin has said : " Behold, how lair, how far prolonged in arch and aisle, 

 the avenues of the valleys, the fringes of the hills, the joy of man, the com 



