PEACH AND THE PEAR. 213 



imperfect blossom and the bisexual or perfect blossom. 

 Take the Crescent strawberry for example, one of our 

 most productive sorts ; it has a pistillate or imperfect 

 blossom, and hence can't fertilize itself, and so to ensure 

 a crop of Crescents we must plant to every two rows of 

 them, one row of a variety, (as the Sharpless,) having a 

 bisexual or perfect blossom. The pollen from the anther 

 of the Sharpless fertilizes the ovule in the ovary of the 

 Crescent and thus the perfect Crescent berry is produced. 

 Take a blossom of the Crescent and one of the Sharpless, 

 and note the difference ; the pistils are there generally on 

 the Crescent blossom, and on the Sharpless blossom you 

 see the stamens and the anthers on the top of them, 

 making them, with the pistils and other parts, the perfect 

 or bisexual blossoms. 



The varieties of the Pear number into the thousands, 

 and, probably, over one thousand have been fruited in 

 the United States. We divide Pear trees into the 

 standard or single trees — the dwarf or compound trees, 

 and hybrid trees — and the fruit is spoken of, or rather 

 should be spoken of, as fruit from standard.? — fruit from 

 dwarfs, and fruit from hybrids. The standard is the 

 original Pear tree. The dwarf is one where the pear- 

 stalk has been grafted or budded on the quince root, and 

 thus the tree is, in a measure, dwarfed. It may also be 

 grafted or budded on the thorn and some other roots 

 with the same result. The hybrid tree is one where the 



