28 THE CULTIVATION OF THE 



the peculiar odor to the leaf. The tree blossoms before 

 the leaves appear, and usually the late peaches before 

 the early ones, and this is one reason why the flower is 

 so delicate, being naked at, and for some time subse- 

 quent to, its birth. The blossoms are like those of the 

 rose, expanding from the separate buds, and their 

 leaves are usually pink — darker or lighter in shade — 

 although in some rare varieties they are white, or 

 yellowish-white. In budded varieties the flowers vary, 

 being in some very open and in some nearly closed, 

 whilst in natural fruit they are fuily opened. The bark 

 is of an olive brown color, when healthy, and only 

 moderately thick, and becomes tinged with various 

 shades of pink as the sap advances to the branches. 



The Peach is a drupe or stone fruit. Some are 

 free-stones, some cling-stones, and some neither the one 

 nor the other, and, indeed, in some seasons, the free- 

 stone-fruit does not easily leave the seed, as the 

 canners and evaporators then find to their sorrow. The 

 natural seed are smaller, as a rule, than the budded, more 

 difficult to open, cavities smaller, are cleaner and closer 

 grained, and in color are dark cream, or very light tan, 

 whilst budded seed are more of a maroon color, and are 

 in every way handsomer than the natural seed. The 

 kernel of the natural seed is denser than the others, and 

 seldom contains philopena, as the budded seed often 

 does. The seed of weak or diseased trees is apt 



