MARCH. 137 



last volume ; as we then stated, we have eaten it when we 

 thought it very "indifferent in flavor;" and again when it 

 was " exceedingly fine." Like the Passe Colniar, which it 

 resembles in quality, it is very variable, and like that pear, 

 which has been at times considered unworthy of cultivation, 

 and at others as one of the finest of all pears, it will be 

 variously estimated according as the specimens are produced 

 in greater or less perfection. 



TuE White Doyenne' Pear. — Mr. Eaton thus writes in 

 regard to this old pear : — " Yon say that your White Doy- 

 enne on the quince do not crack, while on adjacent standard 

 trees the fruit is worthless. I have seen the fruit on dwarf 

 trees utterly inedible, while other trees in the same row and 

 within a few feet — also dwarfs — bore fine fruit. I have also 

 seen trees bearing on some branches good specimens, and on 

 others worthless ones. This disease has been much more 

 general and fatal the past season than I ever before knew it ; 

 many trees which have before borne perfect fruit, bearing 

 this season few specimens which were not affected." 



We have nothing new to offer in regard to the cracking 

 of this old pear. We only record facts. Fifteen pyramidal 

 trees on the quince, planted in 1850, and standing in one 

 row in our grounds, six feet apart, bore two and a half barrels 

 of as beautiful fruit in 1855 as one would desire to look 

 at ; while two trees on the pear, planted in 1845, did not 

 perfect half a dozen good specimens. At Rochester, in the 

 nursery of Messrs. Ellwanger & Barry, we saw last October 

 a small square of trees, of the White Doyenne, on the quince, 

 which produced nearly fifty bushels of superb fruit. 



What conditions of culture are necessary to raise this old 

 pear in its ancient beauty we are unable to say. In the city 

 of Boston there are numerous standard trees, fifty to one 

 hundred years old, which have never yet to our knowledge 

 produced a cracked specimen. These trees are all upon the 

 pear, and are by no means remarkably vigorous ; yet they 

 invariably produce the finest fruit. 



VOL. XXII. — NO. in. 18 



