[1880, 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



239 



will please allow me room to find a little fault 

 and offer a few suggestions. 



It is a fact well known that about nine-tenths of 

 the standard pear trees planted in the West are 

 grown in New York and Pennsylvania. These 

 trees are grown according to their best judg- 

 ment, judgments rendered by their ancestors in 

 the faderland generations ago, and have been 

 passed from father to son, and neighbor to neigh- 

 bor, until it now would be considered sacrilege 

 to depart from them. Our objection is to the 

 height of the top and the size of the tree. 



A No. 1 standard pear tree as sent out by 

 these nurserymen is 6 to 8 feet high, 3 to 5 years 

 old, and branched about 5 feet from the ground. 

 Now, Mr. Editor, if I was called upon to tell 

 you what st>rt of a tree is most worthless in every 

 State west of Ohio, I would hardly change the 

 above description. 



A No. 1 standard pear for the West should be 

 3 to 5 feet high. 2 to 3 years old, and branched 

 1 to 2 feet from the ground. The tops must 

 come down as we go west, and for central and 

 western Kansas six inches to a foot is high 

 enough. 



High tops cause the death of more trees than 

 everything else combined, and it does appear to 

 me that we are now using enough pear trees to 

 make it pardonable if we ask you to raise a tree 

 suited to our climate, and as you may think 

 peculiar wants. 



their fathers and mine, have made mistakes, 

 but Avill go to work and raise us some nice little 

 low- topped trees. 



JAPAN PERSIMMONS IN THE ORCHARD 

 HOUSE. 



BY WM. T. HARDING, OAK HILL CEMETERY, UPPER 

 SANDUSKY, OHIO. 



A portrait hangs on the wall before me, and 

 the benignant features of an upright and intelli- 

 gent gentleman seem to gaze steadfastly from 

 the frame, at the writer, and a kindly smile 

 lights up the once familiar face, such as there 

 used to be in days gone by. Any reader of char- 

 acter would readily pronounce the facial expres- 

 sion as noble, winsome and good. No " human 

 face divine " could be more so than was the late 

 Mr. Thomas Rivers, of Sawbridgeworth, England. 

 He was old and gray headed, when the 

 likeness was taken ; while the placid serenity of 

 ripe and honorable years lovingly lingered 

 around the lineaments of one of the best of men. 



When a student in the " art and science of 

 horticulture," I sought his sage counsel, and was 

 encouraged with his friendly advice ; and while 

 sharing his hospitality and enjoying his confi- 

 dence, my young ideas were taught to shoot. 

 As a trainer of trees, he was remarkably adroit. 

 Nothing arboreal or herbaceous could be fairer 

 fashioned than which passed through his hands. 



Among Tiiy earliest recollections, which date The vast quantities of standard roses, every tree 

 back to 1830 to 183 i, I remember the old leaning, j " a thing of beauty," multiplied by thousands, 

 high-topped pear trees in New Jersey, many of I testified to the skill of the good old rosarian. 



them mere shells fi'om the rotting away of the 

 south sides. 



These things caused no thought and no com- 

 ment. They had been planted by our grand- 

 father, who knew it would not do to have the 

 limbs interfere with the horses' hames. 



Famous as he was in floriculture, he was even 

 more so as a practical pomologist. That he was 

 one of the most successful nurserymen and fruit 

 tree growers, par excellence, of the nineteenth 

 century is unanimously acknowledged. 



The two excellent brochures under his signa- 



After living over twenty years in Illinois, and | ture, namely. " The Miniature Fruit Garden," 



and "The Orchard House, or Cultivation of 

 Fruit Trees in Pots under Glass," are good guides 

 to go by. The vim of the author and the vigor 

 of his trees are perceptible in every line to the 

 mind's eye of the reader, who follows his gifted 

 pen. That such "reading made easy " for ama- 

 teur fruit-growers, as well as practical cultivators. 



seeing the advantage of low-topped trees, I 

 returned to the scenes of my childhood. These 

 old trees were gone, compelled to succumb to 

 the folly of the nurseryman who trimmed them. 

 The thriftiest, and in many cases the only trees 

 left in thse venerable orchards, were the ones 

 that chanced to have the lowest tops. The 



above applies to all fruit trees. But as we are i should win proselytes to pomology, is what might 

 able to raise everything except pears, as well or j be expected. Our "kin beyond the sea" readily 

 better than they can, I confine my remarks to ; adopted his views, with most encouraging results, 

 that only for the present. i There, under canopies of glass, as well as on this 



Now, Mr. Meehan, I hope your nurserymen side of the Atlantic, blossom and fruit many a 

 will not get angry at me for hinting that they, ' goodly tree. 



