Chap. XXIV.] FRUIT CULTURE. 411 



because they also bear precious and handsome fruit, they have 

 only to place these objects in any open spots, in pleasure-grounds, 

 by wood-walks, in the fences at intervals, instead of the worthless 

 bushes that now too often occupy them — and, in a word, in the 

 numberless positions where trees good for neither timber nor 

 flowers now take up valuable ground. 



Then there is the ornamental orchard. Usually the orchard 

 is, of all spots, the most formal ; but there is no need that it 

 should be so, as anyone with extensive pleasure-grounds can 

 (|uickly prove. At Meudon, where an ornamental orchard was 

 formed, the position was a valley-like hollow, but in an elevated 

 position — ^just the spot to make a compact Pinetum. Instead of 

 planting it with trees and shrubs of the ordinary type, it was 

 resolved to embellish it with well-arranged groups of fruit-trees. 

 On one side a large clump was devoted to handsome pyramidal 

 Pear-trees, on another to Apples, another to Plums, and so on. 

 The grass was not broken up, nor any of the ornamental features 

 of the spot interfered with in the least. It need hardly be 

 pointed out how varied, as well as useful, such an arrangement 

 might be made. There might be mixed groups of new and 

 untried kinds, as well as masses of tried ones ; there might be 

 isolated specimens of various kinds on the grass, from an Apple 

 on the dwarf Paradise-stock to a fully-grown and handsome Pear. 

 Fruits little known or of doubtful utility, like the Eugenia or 

 the Cherry-plum, might be associated with the others with 

 greater propriety than in the fruit-garden proper. Such things 

 as the xVmerican Blackberries — and very fine some of these are — 

 would find a congenial home ; so would the Dewberry and the 

 various Cranberries. The relatives of our common fruit-trees 

 might of course be planted in the near neighbourhood for 

 comparison's sake ; standard Peaches, Figs and Apricots might 

 bo tried with safety if the garden were in the south ; and the 

 whole would prove one of the most interesting features in a 

 country-place. 



It should be remembered that some of our hardy fruits are 

 capable of afi'ording quantities of wholesome food ; but before they 

 do so efliciently we must take them out of the class of things 

 that are carefully walled-in in gardens, overdone with kindness, or 

 injured by unnatural pruning, and recognise the fact that many 



