62 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



lage of Hubbardston. I then went with a friend to the Gleason 

 farm, which has no buildings, they having been burnt sixty-five 

 years ago, and the farm being now occupied as a pasture. Near 

 where the buildings formerly stood is an orchard of about half 

 an acre, composed entirelj'^ of trees bearing wild or natural fruit. 

 Near the centre of this group of trees stands the original Hub- 

 bardston Nonsuch, now an old tree, the trunk of which is about 

 fifteen or sixteen inches in diameter and hollow, the top broken 

 ofi" at about eight feet above the ground. Vigorous branches had 

 started from the sides of the trunk near the place where the top 

 was broken, and had formed a small sized head, which, as I have 

 since been informed, produced that year two barrels of good 

 apples. I examined the tree carefully to find whether there was 

 any evidence of its having been engrafted, and was satisfied that 

 it had not been. Mr. Bennett, at my request, ascertained that 

 Barzillai Gleason built a house and barn and started this farm 

 about the year 1780, and probably about the same time planted 

 the seed for this old orchard, which would make the trees nearly 

 one hundred years old. These trees are not in rows, but stand at 

 irregular distances, as many old orchards were formerly planted. 

 The orchard, and in fact the whole farm, occupies a westerly slope, 

 about half way from the top of the hills, which are large, to the 

 valleys, and has a soil of gravelly loam, quite rocky, cold, and 

 rather wet, and is what would be called good grazing land. 



This apple was first brought to notice by a Mr. Murdock, of 

 Newton, Mass., who had friends living on the next farm. Return- 

 ing from a visit to Hubbardston, he carried with him a few of these 

 apples ; some of them he gave to Mr. Samuel Hyde, of Newton, 

 who was engaged in the nursery business, and who was so much 

 pleased with the fruit that he procured scions, and propagated and 

 disseminated it. This was about the year 1828 or 1830. Previ- 

 ous to this time a man by the name of Dana Parker, of Hubbards- 

 ton, had called it the Nonsuch ; Mr. Hyde, to distinguish it from 

 other apples of that name, called it the Hubbardston Nonsuch. 

 This Mr. Dana Parker claimed to have originated the variety by 

 engrafting a sour apple tree with scions from a sweet one, and 

 some credulous persons believed it ; but there stands the old tree, 

 a living witness to the falsity of any such pretensions. 



The Hunt Russet apple was cultivated about Concord, Mass., 

 more than any other apple, until the introduction of the Baldwin. 



