186 MY FARM. 



of all, that prince or princess of plums, Reine- Claude 

 (Green-Gage), of which, in the sunny towns along 

 the Loire, I have purchased a golden surfeit for a 

 few sous : when I remember those, and their luscious 

 and cheap perfection, crowning the peasants gardens, 

 I am a little disheartened at thought of the tobacco 

 washes, and whale-oil soap and syringes, with which 

 we must enter into combat with the curculio, for 

 only a most flimsy supply. 



The nectarine is subject to the same blight ; and 

 the apricot furnishes only a very dismal residuum of 

 a crop. As an espalier, it is not, I think, so subject 

 to the ravages of the curculio as in its unfettered 

 condition ; but upon the wall (particularly if one of 

 southern exposure), it is exceedingly liable to injury 

 from the late frosts of Spring. I succeed in saving 

 a few from all enemies every year ; but they are so 

 wan so pinched, as hardly to serve for souvenir of 

 the golden Moor-parks which crown an August din 

 ner at Vefours or the Trois-Freres. It is an old fruit ; 

 the Persians had it ; the Egyptians have gloried in 

 it these centuries past ; Columella names it in his gar 

 den poem ; and Palladius advises that it be grafted 

 upon the almond : * will the nurserymen make trial ? 



* It occurs in Tit. vii., Novem., where he discourses of the 

 peach. &quot; Inseritur in se, in amygdalo, in pruno : sed ARMENIA, vel 

 PR.ECOQUA prunis, duracina amygdalis meiius adhwcscunt,&quot; etc. 



