lO ORCHARD SOIL. 



Happily, however, the rough handed experience of every day 

 hfe has been able to get on in advance of Science. The practical 

 farmer has not to wait for the chemist to tell him which of his fields 

 are most productive. The dairyman, for example, soon finds out 

 from which of his meadows he gets the best milk, the richest cream, 

 and the most valuable cheese ; and his next object is to get the 

 best breed of cattle to graze them, or in other words to find the 

 cows that will best perform their part in dairy produce. So it is 

 with the Orchardists, the liquor in his vats will soon point out to 

 him the particular Orchards which offered him Nature's best 

 laboratory for the production of the finest and strongest Cider ; and 

 his efforts should then be directed to get them provided with the 

 best varieties of fruit trees. It is with Orchards moreover, as it is 

 so remarkably the case with Vinyards, that some portions of the 

 ground will produce much finer liquor than the rest, although the 

 soil apparently is the same throughout. The fact is undoubted, 

 but the reason seems inscrutable and beyond the powers of 

 chemistry to define. 



The Cider and Perry from the English Orchards are admitted 



to be superior in quality and strength to those liquors from other 



countries, and thus our Orchards should show the soil best suited 



to their production. The evidence from history on this point is not 



quite satisfactory, for all the authorities of the 17th century agree in 



recommending light sandy soils, such as are usually termed " Kye 



Lands." 



" Look where the full-eared Sheaves of Rye 



Grow wavy on the Tilth, that Soil select 



For Apples." Philips " Cyder." 



Mr. Thomas Andrew Knight says " the excellence of the Cider 

 formerly made from the Hedstreak, Golden Pippin, and Stire apples 

 in light soils seems to evince that some fruits receive benefit from 

 those qualities in the soil by which others are injured." Marshall 

 gives the instance of the once celebrated Stii'e, which in the lime- 

 stone lands of the Forest of Dean yielded an incomparably rich and 

 highly flavoured Cider, but when grown in the deep, rich soil of the 

 vale of Gloucester, afforded a liquor only useful for its strength and 

 roughness. The Hagloe Crab again, another celebrated apple in its 



