DIFFICULTIES TO CONTEND AGAINST. 97 



In our climate, fruit-trees require especial attention. They 

 will not take care of themselves, and the cultivator must realize 

 that without constant diligence he cannot expect success. Dif- 

 ferent varieties require different soils and different treatment. 

 We must therefore study the constitution and character of each, 

 if we would secure perfection. 



The different ability of varieties to resist heat and cold and 

 other meteorological agencies, reveals a most wonderful analogy 

 between the vegetable and animal kingdoms ; for while certain 

 animals find their natural home in the frigid zones, others in 

 the temperate, and still others in the torrid, there are some that 

 are cosmopolitans. So with our fruits. Some are suited to one 

 locality, some to another, and a very few to a great variety of 

 latitudes. Upon the observation and study of these depends 

 much of the success in fruit culture. Our soil and climate in 

 Massachusetts is not naturally very propitious for the cultiva- 

 tion of the pear, yet there are numerous varieties which prosper 

 as well as our forest-trees, and are as sure of a crop of fruit as 

 the former are of nuts. Tlie Bartlett pear-trees, originally 

 brought from England more than sixty years since, still survive 

 in Dorchester, (now Boston,) and have never failed to produce 

 fruit annually. For more than twenty years the Beurr^ d'Anjou, 

 Doyennd Boussock and Vicar of Winkfield pears have scarcely 

 ever failed of giving a crop. Certain varieties are adapted to a 

 wide extent of territory. Tlie Red Astrachan apple and the 

 Bartlett pear succeed throughout our country. 



But we have special difficulty to contend with in our bleak 

 winds of New England. In the early settlement of Massachu- 

 setts, and in most of our Eastern States, delicate fruits, such as 

 the peach, apricot and plum, bore and ripened their fruit freely. 

 Then these fruits were planted in gardens or sheltered locations, 

 and in the openings or by the side of the woods, by which, im- 

 mediately or at no remote distance, they were protected from 

 the extremes of our climate, and the fierce dry winds to which 

 they are now exposed. When, by degrees, this natural protec- 

 tion had been removed, the peach and some of our more deli- 

 cate varieties of the apple, pear and other fruits, began to 

 decline, and are no longer to be relied on ; and yet these same 

 fruits, in the middle and Southern States, succeed most perfect- 

 ly ; and so, in some of our new Western States and Territories, 

 13 



