THE PEACHES OF NEW YORK 1 79 



Flower-buds small, short, conical, pubescent, plump, free; blossoms appear in mid- 

 season; flowers pink, one and one-half inches across, well distributed, usually in twos; 

 pedicels short, thick, glabrous, green; calyx-tube dull reddish-green, orange-colored within, 

 campanulate, glabrous; calyx-lobes short, broad, obtuse, glabrous within, slightly pubescent 

 without; petals round-ovate, tapering to short, broad claws red at the base; filaments 

 one-half inch long, shorter than the petals; pistil pubescent at the ovary, equal to the 

 stamens in length. 



Fruit matures early; two and one-fourth inches long, two and one-half inches wide, 

 round-oblate, slightly compressed; cavity deep, wide, abrupt, with tender skin; suture 

 shallow, becoming deeper at the extremities; apex roimdish or flattened, with mucronatc 

 tip variable in size; color deep orange-yellow, blushed with dark red, indistinctly splashed 

 and mottled; pubescence heavy; skin thin, tender, adherent to the pulp; flesh yellow, 

 tinged with red near the pit, juicy, stringy, tender, melting, sweet but sprightly; good in 

 quality; stone semi-free to free, one and one-fourth inches long, seven-eighths inch wide, 

 oval to obovate, flattened at the base, tapering to a short point, with grooved surfaces; 

 ventral suture deeply grooved along the sides, wide; dorsal suture a deep, wide groove. 



ALEXANDER 



I. Cult. &f Count. Gent. 38:598. 1873. 2. Mich. Hort. Soc. Rpl. 263, 26.i. 1874. 3. Card. .Mon. 

 17:367, 368. 1875. 4. .4»i. Pom. Soc. Cat. 28. 1877. 5. Card. Mon. 19:147, 303. 1877. 6. Hojrg 

 Fruit Man. 4i6. 1884. 7. Mich. Hort. Soc. Rpt. 424. 1886. 8. r?i. 5;o. B»/. 39:809, figs. 5 &■ 9. 1896. 

 9. Ont. Fr. Exp. Sta. Rpt. 6:21 fig. 1899. 10. Fulton Peach Cult. 173. 1908. 11. Waugh -Im. Peach 

 Orch. ig8. 1913. 12. U. S. D. A. Plant Immigrants 117:958. 1916. 



Alexander's Early. 13. Am. Pom. Soc. Rpt. 75, 76. 1873. 14. Horticulturist 28:224. 1873. 



For nearly a half-century Alexander has been one of the notable early 

 peaches on this continent, hardiness and vigor of tree contributing with 

 earliness to make the variety popular. Unfortunately, there are few 

 fruit-characters to commend Alexander; the peaches run small, the flesh 

 clings to the stone and is so tender that the two can be separated only with 

 difficulty, and the quality is poor. Added to the defects of the fruit the trees 

 have the grave fault of being unproductive. The fruits, too, are very sus- 

 ceptible to brown-rot but to offset this weakness, the trees are more resistant 

 to leaf -curl than those of the average variety. Alexander has been more or 

 less grown in every peach-region on this continent, sometimes attaining 

 considerable commercial importance, but is now widely cultivated only on 

 the Pacific Slope, and even here it is evidently destined to pass out before 

 many years in the competition with newer and better sorts. It is often 

 confused with Amsden though the two are quite distinct. 



Alexander originated soon after the Civil War on the farm of O. A. 

 Alexander, Mount Pulaski, Illinois. Since 1877 it has been on the fruit- 

 list of the American Pomological Society. It has been the parent of a 

 score or more of meritorious extra-early peaches. 



