THE PEACHES OF NEW YORK 83 



Stones. (2) That peach-trees produce nectarines by bud-variation and 

 nectarine-trees likewise produce peaches, and that either the nectarines or 

 peaches so arising will come true to seed. (3) That either peach or 

 nectarine-trees may produce individual fruits half-nectarine and half- 

 peach. (4) A case is cited of a nectarine tree bearing a half-and-half fruit 

 and subsequently a true peach. 



It must be noted that in all of the variations so far recorded there 

 are no intermediate forms between the two fruits. The peach produced 

 in these bud-variations is a peach and nothing but a peach ; the nectarine, 

 a nectarine and nothing but a nectarine. Even in those remarkable 

 phenomena, of which several are recorded, in which the fruits are divided 

 into halves or quarters, one or more segments being peach and one or more 

 nectarine, there can be no mistake as to peach and nectarine in pubescence, 

 color or flavor. The nectarine from the peach, thus becomes as clear- 

 cut a case of discontinuous variation as can be. If we accept the mutation 

 theory of the origin of species — new species arising suddenly at a single 

 step — the nectarine is a species in process of birth. 



As yet we are entirely ignorant in regard to the conditions under whicli 

 the peach or the nectarine sports, the one producing the other. It is wholly 

 a natural phenomenon, for no one has been able to cause the peach to 

 produce the hairless form or the nectarine to bring forth a downy fruit. 

 The relations of the two fruits have furnished a fertile field of inquiry for 

 over a century but the problem is one of those mysterious ones in which 

 there are many facts that cannot be fitted into a theory, so that our ignor- 

 ance is as profovmd now as ever. There are, however, several theories 

 which, without going into full detail, need to be stated. 



The oldest notion is that the production of a nectarine on a peach- 

 tree is due to the direct action of pollen from some nearby nectarine-tree 

 on the ovary of the peach. This theory, wholly at variance with present 

 knowledge, is also discredited by the many instances in which the sports 

 occur when the two fruits are not growing in the same neighborhood 

 or even region. Thus, within ten years, several cases of nectarines on 

 peach-trees have occurred in this State where the nectarine is scarcely 

 known. Besides, crossing these fruits shows no direct effect of pollen — ■ 

 as is true with nearly all other plants. Still further, when a branch of a 

 peach has borne a nectarine it usually goes on year after year producing 

 nectarines; and certainly impregnation of a flower by foreign pollen could 

 not so profoundly modify a branch. There is so little foundation for this 



