FRUIT TREES. 61 



tree, tliat is, a tree which produces better, or at least a different 

 kind of fruit from its wild ancestors, produces trees not only 

 very different from itself and them, but this difference will be 

 greater if the seed be taken from the young seedling's first or 

 early fructification, than it will be if taken from the same iree 

 after it has been many years in bearing. 



To improve or ameliorate truit trees, therefore, as expedi- 

 tiously as possible, young seedlings should be forced into bear- 

 ing as early as may be, and the seed first produced planted. 

 Pursuing this method, Van Mons, notwithstanding the seed that 

 he was obliged to use in his first experiments were obtained 

 from ancient varieties, whose age, although uncertain, was much 

 advanced, was enabled to reach, in forty two years, the fruit of 

 the fifth generation of his pear trees, all of which was good and 

 excellent. His first generation yielded their first fruit in from 

 twelve to fifteen years, his second in from ten to twelve years, 

 his third in from eight to ten years, his fourth in from six to 

 eight years, and his fifth in six years, and in the eighth genera- 

 tion he obtained a k\v pear trees which fructified at the age of 

 four years. He also found that three or four generations with- 

 out interruption, from parent to son, and from twelve to fifteen 

 consecutive years, were sufficient to obtain no other than excel- 

 lent fruit Irom the stones of peaches, apricots, plums and cher- 

 ries ; — that to obtain none other than good apples, only four 

 generations, and about twenty years, were required. 



Such, briefly, according to Van Mons, is the philosophy of 

 improving fruit trees. But why, it may be asked, if fiuit trees 

 are capable of such rapid improvement, by reproduction from 

 seed, do so few seedling trees among us produce good fruit ? 

 From the theory of Van Mons may be obtained a philosophic 

 answer to this inquiry. Trees, like all other organized beings, 

 have limited periods of youthful growth, maturity, and decay. 

 Trees propagated by cuttings, scions, &ic.,are only the multipli- 

 cation of individuals, and subject to the same great law of na- 

 ture. Their age, however late they may have commenced an 

 independent existence, must be considered the same as that of 

 the parent stock, and when the full period of the natural life of 



