Our Pear Cidtiirc all ^iackcry. 



OUR PEAR CULTURE ALL QUACKERY. 



By C. M. HovEY, Ex-President of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society. 



Aftek reading about all that has been written upon the pear for the 

 last century ; after personally inspecting the extensive pear gardens of 

 the Luxembourg in Paris, and of the Horticultural Society of London ; 

 after familiarizing ourselves with what has been accomplished in pear 

 growing in the present century, — of the labors of Van Mons and Knight, 

 of Bivort and Gregoire ; after comparing the numerous varieties of to- 

 day with those of only thirty years ago ; and after devoting a good por- 

 tion of our own life to pear culture, — we had begun to think, and really 

 believed, that we had made some advance in our own time in the profit- 

 able production of this delicious fruit. We recollected when only the 

 St. Michael, the St. Germain, the Chaumontclle, the Jargonelle, the 

 Black Worcester, and a few others, were all the sorts actually found in 

 our markets, or even known to our cultivators ; and when we com- 

 pared the present with those days, and thought of the Fulton, the 

 Swan's Orange, the Lawrence, the Heathcot, the Bloodgood, the Dear- 

 born's Seedling, the Howell, the Tyson, the Brandywine, the Washing- 

 ton, the Adams, the Pratt, the Tea, the Abbott, the Hovey, the CLipp's 

 Favorite, the Mount Vernon, the Sheldon, the Goodale, and many more, 

 all brought to notice in less than a, single generation, we were con- 

 vinced that something had been achieved, somebody had labored suc- 

 cessfully, in our own country, to say nothing of such pears as the Bart- 

 Ictt, the Beurrc d'Anjou, the Duchesse, the Doyenne du Comice, the 

 Louise Bonne, the Marie Louise, and a host of others, introduced from 

 abroad. 



We repeat, that with these impressions we had indulged in the belief 

 that we had made great progress in pear culture. To llll our markets 

 with the Bartlett in place of the Jargonelle, the Louise Bonne in place 

 of the St. Michael, the Beurre d'Anjou in place of the Bergamot, and 

 the Lawrence in place of the Chaumontclle, was something to be proud 

 of, wliilc we were repaid in a generous and remunerating sum f(n' our 

 skill. But it appears we were once more i:i error ; that all our fancied 



