812 THE PARKS AND GARDENS OF PARIS. [Chap. XIX. 



and abundance of bloom. By precocity we mean not early 

 flowering witb regard to season, but with reference to age also; 

 wliile other stocks of the same age have not reached the fruiting 

 stage, this one has already done so. It is of rather straggling 

 habit, but full of flower. While some stocks at the time of our 

 visit were showing few flowers and others none at all, this one 

 stood out in the row sheeted over with pale pink blossoms. 

 These qualities it very markedly contributes to the grafts. Short 

 compact growth, and early and abundant flowering, characterise 

 the scions grafted on this stock, as they characterise the stock 

 itself. A long row in one of the quarters, consisting of various 

 Apples grafted on this stock, side by side with rows grafted on 

 other stocks, is one of the most striking illustrations of the effects 

 and consequences of grafting it has ever been our fortune to 

 witness. The difference in appearance is so great that it would 

 almost seem as if the one row were cultivated for fruit, the other 

 for timber ! By way of illustration we may mention the Ehode 

 Island Greening, a vigorous-growing kind, but which when 

 worked on this stock becomes subdued, assumes a short, bushy 

 habit, and produces an abundance of early bloom. What was 

 formerly grown at Chiswick under the name of French Paradise 

 is quite a different thing, and relatively very inferior. Of course 

 this Paradise stock is not intended for orchard use, where the 

 freer-growing stocks are preferred. The French Paradise stock 

 is of spreading habit, with pale purplish shoots. The inflorescence 

 is abundant, and precocious as to season, and also in relation to 

 the age of the plant. The young leaves are glabrescent, oblong- 

 lanceolate, the apex acute, the base rounded, the margin crenu- 

 lated, the crenulations mucronulate ; the petiole is less than half 

 the length of the leaf, setose, and the stipules are linear-subulate, 

 as long as the petiole. The peduncles are about three-quarters 

 of an inch long, setose ; the flower-tube glabrous urceolate, 

 reddish, one-eighth of an inch long ; the calyx-lobes triangular, 

 gradually acuminate, setose within ; the petals concave, oblong- 

 obtuse, tapering at the base into a short stalk, and provided with 

 a few cottony hairs on the inner surface ; the styles are crested 

 at the base for a short distance, and there slightly covered with 

 cottony hairs, dividing above into five stigmatic branches. The 

 fruit, which is a really good early eating Apple, is, according to 



