THE STONELESS PLUM 45 



tribe of fruits represented by the plums, cherries, 

 peaches, apricots, and almonds, this shell has been 

 developed until it is veritably stonelike in 

 texture. 



It is almost self-evident why this extraordi- 

 nary development of the protective seed covering 

 was necessary in the case of this particular tribe 

 of plants. 



It is altogether probable that the original pro- 

 genitor of all the family of stone fruits grew in 

 central Asia. I have received from that region 

 a shrub that may perhaps be regarded as the pro- 

 totype of the entire race of the stone fruits — not 

 perhaps the direct progenitor, but an early 

 offshoot from the ancestral stock which has 

 remained in the original environment and has 

 not, perhaps, very markedly changed from the 

 original state during the hundreds of generations 

 in which the other branches of the family were 

 spreading southward and westward across Asia 

 and Europe. 



If we could know just what the enemies of 

 the primitive Asiatic stock of the stone fruits 

 were like, we could perhaps surmise the reason 

 for the development of the unusual seed 

 cover. 



Perhaps the stone was necessary to protect the 

 kernel from the teeth of monkeys or primitive 



