THE APPLE. ITS VARIETIES. 97 



" La Pomme d'Or est venue d'Angleterre ; on I'y apelle Goule-Pepin. 

 J'estime qu'elle doit etre la Reyne des Pommes, et que la Reynette ne 

 doit marche qu' apres elle ; car elle est d'un plus fin relief que toutes 

 les autres Pommes." Switzer calls it " the most antient, as well as most 

 excellent apple that is." But it is not my intention to record all that 

 has been written in praise of the Golden Pippin, for that of itself would 

 occupy too much space, my object in making these extracts being simply 

 to show the gradual progress of its popularity. 



The late President of the London Horticultural Society, T. A. Knight, 

 Esq., considered that the Golden Pippin, and all the old varieties of 

 English apples, were in the last stage of decay, and that a few years 

 would witness their total extinction. This belief he founded upon the 

 degenerate state of these varieties in the Herefordshire orchards, and 

 also upon his theory that no variety of apple will continue to exist more 

 than 200 years. But that illustrious man never fell into a greater error. 

 It would be needless to enter into any further discussion upon a subject 

 concerning which so much has already been said and written, as there is 

 sufficient evidence to confute that theory. The Pearmain, which is the 

 oldest English apple on record, shows no symptoms of decay, neither 

 does the Catshead, London Pippin, Winter Quoining, or any other variety ; 

 those only having been allowed to disappear from our orchards, which 

 were not worth perpetuating, and their places supplied by others infinitely 

 superior. 



It is now considerably upwards of half a century since this doctrine 

 was first promulgated, and though the old, exhausted, and diseased trees 

 of the Herefordshire orchards, of which Mr. Knight spoke, together with 

 their diseased progeny — now that they have performed their part, and 

 fulfilled the end of their existence — may ere this have passed away, we 

 have the Golden Pippin still, in all the luxuriance of early youth, where 

 it is found in a soil congenial to its growth ; and exhibiting as little 

 symptoms of decay as any of the varieties which Mr. Knight raised to 

 supply the vacancy he expected it to create. 



In the Brompton Park Nursery, where the same Golden Pippin has 

 been cultivated for nearly two centuries, and continued from year to 

 year by grafts taken from young trees in the nursery quarters, I never 

 saw the least disposition to disease, canker, or decay of any kind ; but, 

 on the contrary, a free, vigorous, and healthy growth. 



But this alarm of Mr. Knight for the safety of the Golden Pippin, and 

 his fear of its extinction, were based upon no new doctrine, for we find 

 Mortimer a hundred years before, equally lamenting the Kentish Pippin. 

 After speaking of manures, &c., for the regeneration of fruit trees, he 

 says, " I shall be glad if this account may put any upon the trial of 

 raising that excellent fruit the Kentish Pippin, which else, I feai-, will 

 be lost. For I find in several orchards, both in Kent, Essex, and Hert- 

 fordshire, old trees of that sort, but I can find no young ones to prosper. 

 A friend of mine tried a great many experiments in Hertfordshire, about 

 raising them, and could never get them to thrive, though he had old 

 trees in the same orchard that grew and bore very well. I likewise tried 

 several experiments myself, and have had young trees thrive so well, 

 as to make many shoots of a yard long in a year, but these young shoots 

 H 



