108 SYSTEM. \ri(' rnMOLony 



wlu'tluT cliarat'liTs (•!" /'. Mains or lliose of J\ bacaiid predomi- 

 nate. Trees and leaves are I'aii-ly but not always dislinct in the 

 two species, but there is one chai-acter of the fruit which always 

 separates the species: The calyx jiei-sists on the rijx'ned fruit of 

 the connnon apple; it falls from the ripe fruit of the true crab- 

 aiijile, /*. baccdta. 



157. Pyrus Malus, the common apple, described. — The sys- 

 tematist is saved niucli confusion in studyinjj: lyix's if he has 

 before him the botanical characters of the species to which 

 cultivated varieties are referred by different botanists. This is 

 particularly true of the apple, since several species and several 

 botanical varieties are given by different authors as the wild 

 form from which the domesticated sorts have sprung. The char- 

 acters of the species in which the common apple is put in this 

 text are given, therefore, in detail. 



1. Pyrus Malus, Linn. (Plate I) Plant a large bush or a tree attain- 

 ing a height of 60-70 feet with a trunk 1-2 feet in diameter which divides 

 into stout spreading branches forming a round open head; bark separating 

 into large, thick, ashy-brown persistent scales; branchlets and twigs 

 glabrous or slightly pubescent, usually bright red-brown and dotted Avith 

 scattered conspicuous lenticels. Leaves oval, ovate or orbicular-ovate, 

 usually pointed at the apex, rounded or truncate at the base, with serrate 

 margins, dull in color, soft in texture, borne on stout petioles. Flowers 

 large, white, pink or red, borne in close terminal cymose clusters on short 

 pedicels; appearing with the leaves; calyx-lobes 5, acuminate; petals 5, 

 inserted, remotely contracted into narrow claws, usually pink. Fruit ex- 

 ceedingly variable in size, shape, color, flavor and time of ripening, with 

 a cavity about the stem, the calyx persistent and set in a well-marked basin ; 

 flesh thick, succulent and homogeneous. Seeds brownish, glossy, mucilagi- 

 nous, usually two in each of the five carpels forming the core. 



158. Habitat and history of the apple. — P. Mahis has been 

 known as a wild plant in temperate Europe and Asia throughout 

 historic times, but unquestionably its fruits were used long 

 before history began, and no doubt also the plants were dis- 

 tributed by the prehistoric dwellers in the two continents. Stu- 

 dents of the origin of cultivated plants now think the species 

 to be indigenous in the northwestern Himalayas, where there are 

 vast forests of wild apples ascending the mountains to a height 

 of nine to ten thousand feet in regions to w^hich man could 

 hardly have introduced the plant. 



