APPLES 



57 



toward a rapid improvement and better 

 adaptation to human needs. So great 

 have been the changes that to the un- 

 scientific mind the lowly origin of the 

 apple seems incredible. 



The Apple and tlie Hawthorn 



Botanically the hawthorn, choke-berries, 

 service-berries, mountain ash, crab apple 

 and the improved varieties of apples be- 

 long to the same family. As a boy in 

 "West Virginia the writer saw 100 grafts 

 from a seedling apple inserted in haw- 

 thorn stock, and a few of them grew. 

 The fact that they lived shows such 

 structural relations as to make reasonable 

 the contention of botanists that they be- 

 long to the same group. 



The Apple and the Wild Crab 



There is now no question among hor- 

 ticulturists that the improved varieties 

 of apple have come from a wild crab, 

 discovered originally in the forests of 

 Europe and the Orient. 



■^Tien the first settlers came to America 

 they found a species of wild crabs grow- 

 ing in the forests and being used by the 

 aborigines for food. When these settlers 

 crossed the Allegheny mountain range 

 and came into the Ohio and Mississippi 

 valleys, they found it growing there. In 

 1865 the writer came to Illinois, settled 

 on the prairies near the eastern border 

 of the state, and found groves of crab 

 trees, hawthorns, plums and cherries 

 scattered along the streams skfrting the 

 bodies of timber, and in clumps on the 

 prairies, sometimes not more than a 

 dozen trees in a group, but there they 

 were, with every evidence of having 

 grown there for a long period before the 

 first w-hite settlers came to that country. 

 How they came to be there no one seemed 

 to know, and few cared to inquire. The 

 original settlers took it as a matter of 

 course — the way of nature — and thought 

 no more about it than they did of the 

 larger forests that skirted the rivers, or 

 the grass that grew upon the prairie. 

 However, from these wild fruits they 

 made crab apple butter, plum preserves, 

 cherry pies and other delicacies that fur- 

 nished fruit acids much needed as an 



article of food and for the preservation 

 of health. 



Varieties of Crabs 



There are four varieties of crab apples 

 said to be native to North America. 



The first is the Common Wild Crab, of 

 the northeastern United States and Can- 

 ada. 



The second is the Narrow Leaved Crab 

 of the middle and southern states. 



The third, the Prairie States or Soulard 

 Crab. 



The fourth, the Oregon Crab. 



Of these varieties the Soulard Crab 

 is the best. Considerable controversy 

 has grown up as to the origin of the 

 Soulard Crab. Downing in his "Fruit and 

 Fruit Trees" says: "It originated with 

 Antoine Lessieur, Portage des Sioux, a 

 few miles above St. Louis." The Hon. 

 James G. Soulard of Gibson, Illinois, in- 

 troduced it and claimed to be the origi- 

 nator. His account of its origin is as fol- 

 lows: "It originated on a farm about 12 

 miles from St. Louis, Missouri, where 

 stood an American crab thicket not en- 

 closed near the farm house. The thicket 

 was cut down and the ground cultivated 

 some two or three years. Culture being 

 discontinued another crab thicket sprung 

 up and when bearing, one tree, the iden- 

 tical of which is called the Soulard Crab, 

 was discovered. The fruit astonished me 

 by its remarkable size. I immediately 

 propagated it by grafting upon crab 

 stock and seedling apples, both stocks 

 producing the same fruit." 



Mr. Soulard believed it was originated 

 by accidental hybridization with the 

 common apple. Others believe it is a nat- 

 ural variation from the crab. Not know- 

 ing the circumstances of this particular 

 case we are not able to offer a solution 

 of the controversy; but under the laws 

 of variation now commonly known it 

 might have originated by either of the 

 methods claimed. It seems to us more 

 probable, however, that it originated by 

 the natural process of variation from the 

 original stock, cultivation having much 

 to do in causing the changes that oc- 

 curred. 



This crab produces apples so nearly in 



