4 THE FRUIT GROWER'S GUIDE. 



similar remarks apply to the dwarfest and earliest, most popular, and often the most 

 profitable of fruits, strawberries. In a word, we have the means at command for afford- 

 ing a full supply of all kinds of hardy fruit, and the better this is in appearance and 

 quality the greater will be the demand by the consuming population. 



If we turn to exotic fruits, we find the most popular of these of home growth surpass 

 the imported. No grapes equal those of the best British cultivators in the massiveness 

 of the clusters and the size, colour, texture, and high flavour of the berries. No 

 peaches are so enjoyable as the best of our own, so delicately tinted, so delightfully 

 refreshing. In nectarine culture we are unrivalled ; and though the fruit, as a smooth- 

 skinned form of the poach, is of foreign origin, some of the foremost varieties in 

 cultivation have been raised from the seeds of home-grown fruit. Apricots are as fine 

 and deliciously flavoured as the most fastidious can desire when grown under favourable 

 circumstances in British gardens. Pineapples of home growth, when produced under 

 the best conditions by expert cultivators, are admittedly superior to the finest samples, 

 good as these are, that come from sunnier climes. Oranges, lemons, and other fruits of 

 the same genus, are produced in some gardens in this country in all respects as good as, 

 and not unfrequently distinctly superior to, those which have to be gathered unripe in 

 their native land for safe transit to our shores. And so we might go on ; but enough is 

 said in support of the proposition that the finest fruit of the most cherished kinds, the 

 noblest in size, the most charming in colour, and the richest in flavour, can be grown 

 with the skill and cultural aids that are within our resources as a nation. 



It is not suggested that full crops of all kinds of hardy fruits can be insured, during 

 all seasons and in every district by all persons who plant trees. There are no varieties 

 of fruit sufficiently hardy in the essential organs of fructification to resist the effects 

 of adverse weather at a critical time, but those persons who choose positions for fruit 

 culture the most wisely, proportion the kinds, and select the varieties the most carefully, 

 and bring the best knowledge to bear on the work of cultivation and management, 

 will have the greatest chance of success. Indeed, it is not too much to say that by 

 proceeding on sound lines in all those respects, abundance of fine fruit would be 

 produced, while in the absence of those governing principles, little or none would 

 be forthcoming, or at the best the produce would be inferior. 



If any doubt should exist in respect to skill being the motive power in the produc- 

 tion of fruit, a thousand instances could be adduced for dispelling such doubt and 

 proving that the facts are as stated. What do inferior crops of fruit under glass, such 



