WILD CRABS 271 



fruits. If the quince is a valuable culinary fruit, the 

 better varieties of the wild American crab are worthy 

 a place in the garden and orchard for the same 

 purposes. The crab is much the hardier, handsomer 

 tree, and subject to much fewer ills than the quince, 

 and is usually enormously productive of its peculiar 

 austere fruit. The wild crab ripens its fruit from 

 early autumn until the following summer. The old 

 practice in pioneer times was to bury the hard fruit in 

 the soil late in autumn and so leave it until spring, 

 when it would open out a fine golden yellow. 



"In its wild state, this crab is a variable fruit in 

 size, color, flavor, shape and time of ripening. I have 

 seen trees of it growing wild, with fruits averaging 

 fully two inches in diameter. The fruit of the Soulard 

 runs from one and a -half to two inches. The fruit 

 of it is generally round, somewhat flattened, averaging 

 about an inch in diameter, though often larger or 

 smaller. It is rarely oblong, sometimes pyriform, and 

 I have seen it (or one of the same type) in one instance 

 with the fruit pyriform, and with a bright red cheek, 

 growing in the woods miles away from domesticated 

 apples; and I have heard of two other like instances. 

 The better varieties of our wild crab should be a fruit 

 of value in the far north, above the line where the 

 common apple can be safely grown. And there is no 

 doubt, from its natural variability, that a fruit of con- 

 siderable value could be produced from it for culinary 

 purposes. The pioneers had little use for it, simply 

 because sugar in those days cost money, and money 

 at times was not to be had." 



The Fluke crab is another of these hybrids, from 

 Iowa, with fruits as large as those of the Mathews. 



