U INTRODUCTION. 



directly thereafter. An apple orchard in full bearing, the 

 tempting fruit blushing among the foliage, or covering the 

 ground with a profusion of golden " nuggets " such as no 

 mine can yield, has a fullness of beauty which, while it 

 charms the eye, appeals not less successfully to other senses. 

 Hon. H. T. Brooks once said in an agricultural address, 

 when alluding to the value of the apple : " By no earthly 

 process, in my opinion, can so much nutriment be so cheap- 

 ly extracted from four square rods of ground as by planting 

 an apple-tree in the centre, and giving it good cultivation. 

 Apples need the ground, the whole of it, and all it contains, 

 but "immemorial usage" allows an apple-tree no rights 

 that husbandmen are bound to respect. It is haggled and 

 mangled, roots and branches, and the soil exhausted in the 

 production of other crops. Charging the apples with the 

 ground they actually grow upon and appropriate, they give 

 far better returns as food for man or beast than corn, wheat, 

 or potatoes. New York, particularly Western New York, 

 has a character at home and abroad for fruit. If a better 

 apple country was ever made, I confess I never heard of it. 

 We occupy the precise position where the tree is hardy and 

 healthy, and the fruit comes nearest perfection. I know of 

 no ordinary farm crop that at all compares, during a series 

 of years, with apples, if we take into the account the small 

 expense at which they are raised. Should we reduce the 

 yield to one half-barrel to the tree, apples would still be our 

 most profitable crop. I boldly claim that the average of 

 our orchards could be doubled by good cultivation. An 

 acre of ground that will produce forty barrels of good fruit 

 ought to be excused from growing grain. Whatever grain 

 or root crops are grown upon it, detract, doubtless, more 

 than they are worth from the apple crops. We can not, 

 without great expense and trouble, return to the soil all the 

 elements which our wheat, corn, and potatoes take from it. 



