CRITIQUE ON AUGUST HORTICULTURIST. 



Pear Culture, No. 4. — Dr. Ward, in the sensible, practical articles he has writ- 

 ten on this frnit, has laid every pear grower in the country under lasting obliga- 

 tion ; and could they have been written six or eight years ago, when the dwarf- 

 pear appetite of the country first began to crave the pabulum so temptingly offered 

 to its taste, thousands on thousands of dollars, and a world of vexation and dis- 

 appointment, would have been saved to those who, unwittingly to themselves, 

 have been victimized by their attempts to cultivate them. But, American like, 

 we have all " pitched in" to dwarf pear culture together, without knowing any- 

 thing about the philosophy of the thing, and taken the ipse dixit of enthusiasts 

 and theorists, who, perhaps as unwittingly as to the results as ourselves, have 

 propagated them to an enormous extent, and recommended them for cultivation. 



That some varieties of the pear can, in some cases, be successfully cultivated on 

 the quince, there can be no doubt. They have been so cultivated in Europe for 

 centuries. They have been occasionally cultivated in this country for some years 

 prior to the late pear furor — perhaps twenty, thirty, fifty, or even more. To 

 understand the subject, let us examine the pear, of itself, on its own stock, as a 

 fruit. In its finer varieties it is a rare fruit, of exquisite excellence in flavor, and 

 flourishes, permanently, only in favorable localities, and in peculiar soils. In 

 America it is a capricious fruit, yielding well only in certain latitudes at all, and 

 then only on favorable positions and soils. It grows, to be sure, in many places ; 

 but in how many places does it flourish — that is, grow well, bear good fruit, and 

 live long, as a general thing, like the apple ? There are the remains of old 

 pear orchards in different parts of the United States — a hundred and fifty years 

 old, perhaps ; but they are only the remains — a few surviving veterans out of the 

 many that were planted with them. The mass of the orchards died out a great 

 many years ago. These, with many others planted since — old trees they are, too 

 — still live, and bear great, almost annual crops, and, in many cases, of excellent 

 named fruit. They are, however, the exception, not the rule. In many instances, 

 too, they have grown and flourished through neglect as well as with good culture, 

 showing not only wonderful vigor and vitality in the individual trees, but a pecu- 

 liarly favorable quality in the soil in which they have stood. Many localities of 

 the kind might be named ; but as my intelligent readers will each recognize them 

 for himself, they need not be here noted. It is sufficient to say, that after an ex- 

 perience of near two hundred years in America, with annual planting and con- 

 stant pains-taking, choice pears are scarce in market, and dear in price as well as 

 rare in private gardens and orchards, even where extraordinary ])ains have been 

 taken to cultivate them. These facts are patent to every man who has any expe- 

 rience in the subject, and we have had as good opportunities to give the thing a 

 fair trial in this country as elsewhere. 



Probably Normandy and Belgium are the best natural Tpcar countries in the world. 

 The most of our best foreign varieties originated there, and they have been intro- 

 duced here with indifferent success, as a whole. Some varieties have proved as 

 good with us, perhaps, as there, but they are few. As a general thing they have 

 failed, both on their own stock and the quince. England is no pear country. 

 Scotland is less so. They have pears there, occasionally, but not choice ones. 

 The best of English pears — the Bartlett, perhaps, excepted — are among our re- 

 jected varieties as table or even cooking fruits. The upshot of our observation 



therefore, that even on its own stock, the pear is uncertain as an orchard fruit 

 with all its contingencies, will not jooy as an investment. 



