THE CULTIVATION OF THE FRUIT-FARM 



CULTIVATION of the soil is keeping its drain- 

 age system — ^that is, its circulation — ^in order. 

 The circulation of the blood in our bodies ceasing, 

 life ceases. The circulation of soluble plant-food 

 in the soil ceasing, plant-growth, plant-life cease. 

 So long as the plant is growing and ripening its 

 fruit, cultivation furthers growth. But we must 

 remember that we do not raise plants as does 

 Nature in the wild. We demand as food the 

 fattened leaf, root, bulb, tuber, stem, stalk, or 

 pulp. The grape-seed, or fruit proper, is useless 

 to us; the juice and pulp are food. We culti- 

 vate the fruit orchard, or the vineyard, not for 

 seed, but for pulp. Therefore all our labor is 

 concentrated upon doing, quite abnormally a 

 mere part of the whole which Nature under- 

 takes. We eat the pulp of the fruit and cast 

 the seed away, as of cherries, peaches, plums, 

 prunes, apples, pears, apricots, grapes, berries of 

 all kinds, currants; not the fruit or seed of po- 

 tato, turnip, beet, or radish, but tuber, or root. 

 The whole problem of fruit-culture is to con- 



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