THE POME-FRUITS 115 



did not list crab-apples until toward the middle of the nineteenth 

 century, this fruit must be considered as a newcomer in this 

 country. 



166. The place of orab-apples in American pomology. — 

 Hybrid and pure-bred crab-apples, cultivated for their fruits, 

 number some twenty odd, with probably quite as many more 

 varieties grown in this country as named ornamentals. These 

 crab-apples are the hardiest of the tree-fruits, grow with great 

 rapidity, thrive in many soils, and bear year after year with 

 increasing abundance. They are most valuable additions to the 

 apple flora of America, and particularly, because of great hardi- 

 ness, promise much for cold regions. The species does not thrive 

 as well as might be wished in southern apple regions, where its 

 usefulness is also much curtailed by its susceptibility to fire- 

 blight. Crab-apple trees are used in all cold climates as stocks 

 upon which to graft the common apple, for which purpose they 

 are in most respects very desirable. The fruits are much used 

 in jellies, preserves, and ciders. No attempts have been made 

 to classify the few varieties^ although a rough guide to their 

 identification is offered in the key to varieties in Chapter XX. 



167. Native crab-apples. — Five species of native crab-apples 

 grow in northern America. None of these is of sufficient merit 

 to recommend for regions in which the common apple grows, 

 but one, the Soulard crab, P. Saulardi, Bailey, probably a nat- 

 ural hybrid betAveen P. Mains and P. ioensis, is grown in the 

 upper Mississippi Valley where only trees of great hardiness 

 withstand the cold. A typical variety of this species is described 

 as the Soulard crab by botanists. There is some promise of 

 further amalgamation of the common apple and the native crab- 

 apples to secure greater hardiness of tree and longer keeping 

 qualities of the fruit. At present, however, consideration of 

 native crabs belongs to botany rather than pomology. 



The Pear 



Nearly all of the innumerable pears belong to P. communis, 

 of which probably more than 5,000 cultivated sorts have been 

 named. In the author's The Pears of New York about 3,000 

 varieties are described, of which all but a score or thereabouts 

 belong to this species, the small number remaining being a part 



