THE APRICOT 275 



ing with them the hardiness of blossom of its 

 phrm ancestor. 



Were the plum and the apricot a little less dis- 

 tantly related the question would admit of a 

 ready answer. 



It would then be almost certain that we could, 

 by a series of selective breedings, produce the 

 desired combination from union of the materials 

 at hand. But the plum and the apricot, as the 

 qualities of the hybrid plumcot show, lie so far 

 apart that their progeny tends to reveal a blend- 

 ing of characters rather than a segregation of 

 unit characters. So it is somewhat less certain 

 than it otherwise would be that the unit charac- 

 ters of the two fruits may be segregated and re- 

 assembled in the way desired. 



Xevertheless, I am disposed to think that this 

 result may prove attainable. There are great 

 variations between the different plumcots. Some 

 of them tend to vary in the direction of the apri- 

 cot, and others in the direction of the plum. By 

 breeding with reference to a particular set of 

 qualities in this case the restoration of the apri- 

 cot qualities and the retention of the hardy 

 quality of plum bloom it would probably prove 

 possible to segregate and reassemble the quali- 

 ties now blended in the plumcot in such a 

 way as to give us a true apricot. Enough has 



