146 



BRITISH POMOLOGY, ETC. 



have ripened their fruit." In the northern counties and in Scotland, it 

 does not succeed as a standard as it does in the south, and even vi^hen 

 grown against a vi^all, there is a marked contrast in the flavor when com- 

 pared with the standard grown fruit of the south. 



It is generally allowed that the Nonpareil is originally from France. 

 Switzer says " It is no stranger in England ; though it might have its 

 original from France, yet there are trees of them about the Ashtons in 

 Oxfordshire, of about a hundred years old, which (as they have it by tra- 

 dition) was first brought out of France and planted by a Jesuit in Queen 

 Mary or Queen Elizabeth's time." It is strange, however, that an apple 

 of such excellence, and held in such estimation as the Nonpareil has always 

 been, should have received so little notice from almost all the early con- 

 tinental pomologists. 

 It is not mentioned in 

 the long list of the 

 Jardinier Francois of 

 1653, nor even by De 

 Quintinye, or the Jar- 

 dinier Solitaire. Scha- 

 bol enumerates it, but 

 it is not noticed by 

 Bretonnerie. It is 

 first described by Du- 

 hamel and subse- 

 quently by Knoop. 

 In the Chartreux cata- 

 logue it is said " elle 

 est forte estimee en 

 Angleterre", but, 

 among the writers of 

 our own country, Swit- 

 zer is the first to notice 

 it. It is not mentioned by Rea, Worlidge or Ray, neither is it enumer- 

 ated in the list of Leonard Meager. In America it is little esteemed. 



246. NORFOLK BEEFING.— H. 



Stnonymes. — Norfolk Beaufin, Hort. Soc. Cat. ed. 3, n. 34. Lind. Guide, 55. 

 Down. Fr. Amer. 120. Norfolk Beau-fin, Rog. Ft: Cult. 59. Norfolk Becfin, 

 Fors. Treat, ed. 3, 124. Reeds Baker, Hort. Soc. Cat. ed. 1, 858. Catshead 

 Beaufin, ace. Hort. Soc. Cat. 



Figures. — Brook. Pom. Brit. pi. xcii. f. 3. Ron. Pyr. Mai. pi. xxxiii. f. 3. 



Fruit, medium sized, three inches wide, and two inches and three 

 quarters high ; oblate, irregular in its outline, caused by several obtuse 

 angles or ribs, which extend from the base to the basin of the eye, where 

 they form prominent knobs or ridges. Skin, smooth, green at first, but 

 changing to yellow, and almost entirely covered with dull brownish-red, 

 which is thickest and darkest next the sun ; sometimes it is marked with 

 a few broken stripes of dark crimson, and in specimens where the color 

 extends over the whole surface, the shaded side is mottled with yellow 



