TO RETARD THE BLOSSOMING. 219 



may be made a specialty on every piece of land near the great 

 markets. 



Mr. I wish to say a word in regard to the apple and 



peach. It is well known to every individual who has lived to 

 the age tbat I have, — threescore years and ten and upwards, — 

 that in old times, when the snow lay on the ground from the 

 latter part of the fall even until into May, and sometimes until 

 the latter part of May, especially around the walls, and in the 

 orchards, that we had enormous crops of peaches and apples. 

 The ground was generally frozen before it was entirely covered 

 with snow, and the frost came out of the ground considerably 

 later than it has in latter years. Our orchards, both apple and 

 peach, never came into blossom until after the frost came out 

 of the ground, consequently, it was later in the season before 

 they put out for bearing. We never had much of any fiost 

 after they came out of blossom, ai:d consequently there was 

 nothing to kill the fruit. At the time of the great September 

 gale, some Ili'ty-four or fifty-five years ago, the trees were so 

 heavily loaded with apples, that when they were blown off, they 

 not only covered the ground, but laid piled on top of each other. 

 If apple and peach trees could be kept back now as they were 

 then, I have not the least doubt that they would be as profitable 

 and fruitful now as they were then. 



The experiment has been tried by some, I believe ; I have 

 heard of one man who had an orchard of some five hundred 

 peach-trees, who became discouraged with it, on account of its 

 not bearing. It would blossom very profusely and very early 

 in the spring, but produce no fruit, and by-and-by he came to 

 the conclusion that he would cut it down as perfectly worthless ; 

 but some time in the course of the winter, when the ground had 

 become perfectly frozen and hard, he turned his sheep into it, 

 and carried in a large quantity of what he called rubbish — 

 straw, old stalks, <fcc, — which covered the ground all over, and 

 when it came spring, the trees did not blossom as usual ; he 

 thought he had killed his trees. He did not cut them down 

 as he had intended, and when finally the frost came out of 

 the ground, his peach orchard bloomed profusely and bore 

 abundantly. I believe it would be just so now, provided the 

 fruit-buds could be kept back. It is the late frosts which come 

 in the spring of the year, which spoil the fruit, not while the 



