II 



Plum Botany 



A I "A | HE plum enthusiasts of America 

 are mostly good botanists. This 

 is necessary from the fact that 

 we have so many species of 

 plums in cultivation. More- 

 over, these species are variable, 

 very difficult for the best bota- 

 nists to discriminate, and now 

 that they are being blended 

 and compounded by hybridization, it requires the 

 closest study and the most intimate acquaintance 

 to know one from another. This knowledge is 

 best gained in the nursery and the orchard, where 

 the horticulturist lives with the multitudinous cul- 

 tivated varieties. Such knowledge, as anyone can 

 see, is vastly superior to that which the botanist can 

 possibly secure from his dried specimens. Thus it 

 has come about that the horticulturists have practically 



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