ESSAY ON THE PEESERVATION OF ERUIT AND 

 THE CONSTRUCTION OF FRUIT HOUSES. 



BY ROBERT MANNING, OF SALEM. 



Twenty or thirty years ago, when winter pears began to be 

 generally cultivated, much disappointment was experienced by 

 cultivators, who found them hard, green, and tasteless, instead 

 of juicy and delicious, as they had been described. But with 

 the introduction of better varieties, improved cultivation, and 

 the maturity of the trees, under our hot suns their ripening 

 became so accelerated that pears, which should have kept un- 

 til mid-winter, or later, could not be preserved to the end of 

 December, and the inquiry was — for means to retard, rather 

 than promote their maturity. I need not spend time in argu- 

 ing the necessity of such means of preservation, especially to 

 those who have found their late pears ripe and gone from one 

 to two months earlier than they had anticipated. 



The ripening of fruit is the completion of the chemical 

 process by which starch is transformed into sugar, and is the 

 first step toward decay. Decay is a process of fermentation, 

 and is but the continuation of the ripening process. What- 

 ever promotes fermentation will hasten the ripening and decay 

 of fruit ; whatever retards fermentation will tend to its pres- 

 ervation. The conditions necessary to the perfect ripening of 

 fruit on the one hand, and its preservation on the other may 

 be stated as follows : 



1st. Unless fruit attains a certain degree of development 



