FRUIT-GROWING FOR PROFIT SMALL HOLDINGS. 259 



The situation of fruit gardens, farms, or orchards mainly in districts favouring produc- 

 tion, points to the importance of being guided chiefly by the placing of the best produce 

 in the markets at the least expense. Growers must consider that, because if they choose 

 to raise more fruit in any locality than is needed by the towns in the immediate neigh- 

 bourhood, the expense in disposing of the surplus must fall upon them. Eailway 

 companies will not carry fruit at specially low rates to populous districts inadequately 

 supplied by the gardens and orchards in their immediate neighbourhood. They act on 

 commercial principles, so must growers of fruit, and if too much is produced in a locality 

 to bo disposed of at a profit in its raw state, it must be dried or converted into jam, 

 or otherwise dealt with. The railway companies have not produced the glut, and they 

 will not clear it away for nothing. 



In the large fruit-growing counties Hereford, Kent, Devon, Somerset, Worcester, 

 Gloucester, and Cornwall, it may be a question whether it will be profitable to materially 

 increase the acreage under fruit, though new plantations must be made from time to 

 time, to maintain the efficiency of the supply of fruit as the older trees fail. In all the 

 other counties of England and "Wales, except Shropshire, Dorset, Middlesex, Monmouth, 

 Berkshire, and Buckingham, the area under fruit is totally inadequate to supply the 

 needs of the towns within easy marketing distances, and it is in these that the best 

 openings for the establishment of small holdings or fruit farms present themselves to 

 those with capital. This decentralization the re -establishment of small holdings, 

 partly on fruit-growing lines primarily for the supply of the markets nearest them, 

 would alike settle the questions relating to railway rates and importations of hardy 

 fruits. In the counties north of the Humber and Mersey, it may not be possible to grow 

 fruit in the immediate neighbourhood of the great centres of industry on account of the 

 deleterious conditions of the atmosphere, but in most rural districts enough fruit could 

 be grown to meet the demands of the consuming community of a quality and at a price 

 securing for it preference over the imported. This is really the one thing needful to 

 enable the British fruit-grower to regain and maintain command of the markets. 



Landowners' Gardens and Fruit Farms. Many of the gardens of the nobility and gentry 

 supply fruit for the market, though few of them produce sufficient to cover the cost of pro- 

 duction, unless the large amount which is often required for home use is properly valued. 



In some cases, however, the ostensible private gardens are really fruit manufactories, 

 especially as regards the output of choice fruits grown under glass. The superinten- 

 dents of such establishments receive encouragement through being allowed to exhibit 



LI. 2 



