l6o THE PEARS OF NEW YORK 



nearly always with unfavorable results. The variety grows well only in 

 comparatively warm climates and on light, warm, limy soils, and refuses 

 to ripen its crop in any others. There are occasional places in eastern 

 America where Easter Beurre can be well grown, but for most part it is at 

 home only on the Pacific slope. The fruits are of first rate excellence when 

 at their best, and add much to the winter supply of pears, the product of 

 few other winter pears surpassing that of this sort from January to March 

 in regions where it does well. The pears are excellent shippers, keep well 

 in common or cold storage, so that where the variety succeeds it is valuable 

 for home, and distant and foreign markets. The trees are in every way 

 satisfactory except that they bloom a little earlier than other sorts, and are 

 somewhat more susceptible to the scab fungus in both fruit and foliage than 

 a commercial variety should be. Although a little too susceptible to blight, 

 the trees are above the average in immunity, and are hardy, vigorous, and 

 productive. The variety is well worth planting in soils and climates where 

 the crop matures properly. 



In the gardens of the Capucin Monastery at Louvain, Belgium, there 

 was, about 1823, an old pear tree known to the monks as the Pastorale de 

 Louvain, which attracted the attention of Van Mons. He propagated the 

 pear and in due course distributed it. By the year 1853, it was to be found 

 pretty generally in the gardens of Belgium under the name of Pastorale. 

 Since that time it has been very widely disseminated, but unfortunately has 

 received a confusing variety of names, Leroy mentioning twenty-four and 

 Mathieu fifty-five. The leading authorities, however, of England and this 

 country have uniformly adopted the name Easter Beurre. It was received 

 in the former country soon after its first dissemination, and it was brought 

 to this country not later than 1837. Since 1862, Easter Beurre has appeared 

 in the list of pears recommended for general cultivation by the American 

 Pomological Society. 



Tree medium in size, vigorous, upright-spreading, open-topped, slow-growing, hardy; 

 branches reddish-brown overspread with gray scarf-skin, sprinkled with inconspicuous 

 lenticels; branchlets variable in length, with short internodes, greenish-brown mingled 

 with red, rough, glabrous, with small, round, raised lenticels. 



Leaf -buds small, very short, obtuse, free. Leaves 2| in. long, if in. wide, thin; apex 

 abruptly pointed; margin finely serrate, the teeth very short, tipped with red; petiole 2 in. 

 long, slender. Flower-buds small, short, conical, plump, free, singly on short spurs; 

 flowers i % in. across, occasionally tinged with pink in the bud, becoming white when open, 

 well distributed, average 9 buds in a cluster; pedicels f in. long, slender, pubescent. 



