STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 211 



AMERICAN FRUITS. ' 



An extract from the address of President Wilder, before the Ameri- 

 can Pomological Society in Chicago, September 8th, 1875 '• 



And now, for a moment, permit me to call your attention to the 

 consideration of the question, " How shall we obtain varieties of fruits 

 which may be adapted to the various latitudes of our immense territory?" 



The great loss sustained in the importation and trials of trees from 

 foreign shores and even from different quarters of our own country, which 

 are not adapted to our location, suggests the answer that new varieties 

 must be produced from seed, and to the manor born, to remedy this evil. 



The adaptation of plants to various climates, and their distribution 

 over the earth, involves a study so profound that few have any definite 

 knowledge on the subject. Why some are suited, by their constitution, 

 to a wide extent of territory, and are able to adapt themselves to almost 

 any altitude or latitude or temperature without material change, while 

 others are confined to a narrow limit, and will not prosper elsewhere ; or 

 why a fruit may succeed in one location, and a few miles distant fail 

 entirely ; why some are aquatic and thrive in arid soils, while others are 

 parasitic, are mysteries which mankind has not yet been able to solve. 

 The human constitution will frequently endure the change of country and 

 climate ; but the extent to which plants can bear these changes is fixed 

 by an immutable law ; therefore, all attempts to acclimate such as are not 

 naturally congenial will fail in the end, except it be within very narrow 

 limits — not, however, that a tree or plant may not sometimes endure 

 greater degrees of cold or heat than it is subject to in its native climate ; 

 but no one should suppose that time will produce a physiological or con- 

 stitutional change in it. 



It is, however, sufficient for us to know that we can produce from 

 seed fruits which, by their constitution and habits, are capable of enduring 

 the cold and heat, the drought and moisture, and other vicissitudes of the 

 region we inhabit ; but the idea that we can accustom a tree or plant to 

 conditions not consistent with its laws of being, is a chimera of the 

 imagination. The only acclimation that we can rely on for obtaining trees 

 and plants of stronger constitution is the production of new varieties 

 from seed hybridized by the hand of man, or naturally cross-fertilized by 

 insects of the air. Whatever opinions may have been entertained, to this 

 we must come at last, that for the acquisition of hardy, valuable fruits, 

 adapted to the various locations of our vast territory, we must depend 

 mainly on the production from seed. Thus I have discoursed to you for 

 many years — thus have I promised to do while I live. 



Much has already been accomplished by the production of new varie- 

 ties of American fruits from seed, but how little compared with the results 



