DESULTORY REMARKS. 7 



We offer these notices merely as matters of fact, without embellishments. 

 Recording nothing that we have not ourselves witnessed, we have quoted 

 no synonims, and referred to the authority of preceding writers no far- 

 ther than to adopt the names by which the fruits are known in the cata- 

 logue of the London Horticultural Society, the most complete work on 

 tin's subject hitherto offered to the public. 



The innumerable errors in the names of fruits, and the perplexity and 

 disappointment arising from this cause, are inconceivable to any but a 

 collector. It is very desisable that there should he some acknowledged 

 standard, to whose authority, in doubtful cases of this nature, we might 

 appeal. Nurserymen and cultivators have generally deemed it a point 

 too trifling for consideration. If a fruit was good, the name was sup- 

 posed to be of no consequence. A better state of things is, however, 

 beginning to prevail, especially in the United Stales, where a knowledge 

 of the subject is widely diffused, and a laudable solicitude is felt (hat 

 catalogues should contain no varieties but what are actually cultivated, 

 and ascertained to be identically the kinds which their titles proclaim 

 them to be. 



The invoices of trees from France frequently furnish instances of un- 

 paralleled ignorance, or even fraud. \Ve have received from what were 

 considered the best establishments, large numbers yearly on one occa- 

 sion several hundred all bearing new and high-sounding names, and 

 the greater part of which were suffered to arrive at maturity 5 but, with 

 very few exceptions, the fruit was entirely worthless. 



There is a peculiar difficulty in making a selection of choice Apples, 

 because, in addition to the very numerous varieties already made known 

 by the different Horticultural societies, and included in the nursery cata- 

 logues, we are constantly receiving accessions from cultivators and col- 

 lectors 5 and, in travelling through New England, we find in almost ev- 

 ery town, and, indeed, on most farms, some valuable fruits, of local 

 origin, which have never been introduced to general notice. Still, we 

 do not despair of success in our endeavors to collect the most desirable 

 kinds, both native and foreign. 



A very large number of new pears has been introduced, and was ren- 

 dered necessary by the degeneracy of most of those fine old varieties, 

 for a long course of years so successfully cultivated in this section of 

 the country. Some of these old kinds still continue to be favorite fruits. 



