DO VARIETIES OF FRUIT RUN OUT ? 



181 



Several of our o;xliardists on the Hudson 

 have bought a number of them, and think 

 it will prove a valuable assistance, even in 

 gathering fruit on a large scale. 



We commend it at all events as a most 



admirable implement for the amateur fruit- 

 grower — one that will save his best and 

 finest specimens of fruit, the limbs of his 

 trees, and perhaps some little uneasiness 

 of mind. 



Do Varieties of Fruit run out? 



BY HENRY WARD BEECHER, OF INDIANOPOLIS, Ia. 



[Many of our readers are not perhaps aware 

 that one of the ablest and most vigorous wri- 

 ters on horticultural subjects, in the United 

 States, is Mr. Bescher, of Indiana. We 

 borrow the following int^^r.-^ti^g article on 

 the subject of the deterioration of varieties 

 from the last number of the Western Far- 

 mer and Gardener. 



Mr. Beecher we are glad to welcome as 

 an ally of our own. He dissents from 

 Knight's theory, that races soon wear out. 

 We have also had the gratification, since 

 our views, which are essentially the same, 

 were published in our work on Fruit Trees, 

 to see them substantially endorsed also by 

 Professor Lindley, the highest European 

 authority. — Ed.] 



We find in the American Agriculturist for Au- 

 gust the following paragraph from a correspon- 

 dent : — 



" My idea is that a tree has a limit as to age, and 

 that in propagating any particular kin" of fruit by 

 ingrafting or inoculating, you do not renew, you 

 merely continue. Am I to understand you as con- 

 troverting this position? Do you mean to be un- 

 derstood as asserting that any particular kind of 

 fruit, the Newtown Pippin, for instance, may be 

 kept in existence forever? My idea is, that nature 

 has, in the vegetable as well as the animal king- 

 dom, provided one, and only one way for the re- 

 newal of life, and that is by the seed. That by 

 engrafting you merely continue what is already in 

 existence — that the tree which you obtain by in. 

 grafting, is no younger than the tree from which 

 that particular variety was originally obtained." 



Is there such similarity between animals and 

 vegetables, in their organic structure, development, 

 and functions, as to make it safe to reason upon the 

 properties of the one from the known properties 

 of the other? 



It is admitted that the lowest forms of vegetable 

 existence are extremely difficult to be distinguished 

 from a corresponding form of animal existence. 

 As we approach the lower confines of the vegeta- 

 ble kingdom, flowers, and of course, seeds, disap- 

 pear. The distinction between leaves and stem 

 ceases; and, at last, the stem and root are no longer 

 to be separated, and we find a mere vegetable sheet 

 or lamina whose upper surface is leaf and whose 

 lower surface is root. In a corresponding sphere 

 animal existence is reduced to its simplest ele- 

 ments. Whatever resemblances there are in the 

 lowest and rudimentary forms of vegetable and 

 animal life, it cannot be doubled that when we rise 

 to a more perfect organization, the two kingdoms 

 become distinct, anil the structure and functions of 

 each are in such a sense peculiar to itself, that he 

 will grossly misconceive the truth who supposes a 

 structure or a function to exist in a vegetable, be- 

 cause such structure or functions exist in an ani- 

 mal, and rice versa. To be sure, they resemble in 

 generals but they differ in specials. Both begin in 

 a seminal point — but the seed is not analogous; 

 both develop — but not by an analogous growth; 

 both require food, but the selection, the digestion, 

 and the assimilation are ditTerent. The mineral 

 kingdom is the lowest. Out of it, by help of the 

 sun and air, the vegetable procures its materials of 

 growth; in turn, the vegetable kingdom is the 

 magazine from which the animal kingdom is sus- 

 tained; to each, thus, the soil contains the original 

 elements; the vegetable is the chemical manipu- 

 lator, and the animal the final recipient of its pro- 

 ducts. The habit of reasoning from one to the 

 other, of giving an idea of the one by illustrations 

 drawn from the other, especially in popular wri- 

 tings, will always be fruitful of misconceptions and 

 mistakes. 



The next idea set forth in the paragraph which 

 we review, is, the essential dissimilarity of buds 

 and seeds. The writer thinks that a plant from a 

 seed is a new organization, but a plant from a bud 

 or graft (which is but a developed bud,) is but a 

 continuation of a previous plant. With the excep- 

 tion of their mteguments, a bud and a seed are the 

 same thing. A seed is a bud prepared for one set 

 of circumstances, and a bud is a seed prepared for 

 another set of circumstances — it is the same embryo 

 in different gai-ments. The seed has been called. 



