142 



THE LARGE EARLY APRICOT. 



Abncot gros precoce ... 7 ~ , 

 ... ' T > of the French. 



Abncot de St. Jean .... 3 



Abricot de St. Jean rouge, in Languedoc. 

 Abricot gros d'Alexandrie, in Provence. 

 Die grosse Friih Apricose. Sickler's Teutsch Obstgartner, 

 band 12. p. 139. taf. 8. 



The earliest Apricot in England is a sort 

 called the Masculine, little grown, and scarcely 

 deserving a place in a Fruit Garden, except for 

 its precocity. This kind, long known in France 

 by the names above cited, is destined to supply its 

 place every where, and to advance the period of 

 maturity of good Apricots to the middle of July in 

 this country. In France it ripens on Midsummer- 

 day, whence its name of A. de St. Jean; but it will 

 not do so here. 



In general appearance it is much like a Roman 

 Apricot, but its quality is better, and it precedes 

 it by ten days or a fortnight ; it is also more com- 

 pressed and elongated. 



Its culture and fertility are not different from 

 the generality of the same class of fruit. 



LEAVES large, broad, oval, rather sharply ser- 

 rated, tapering more to the petiole than perhaps 

 any other, and frequently auricled. 



FRUIT large, somewhat oblong, compressed ; 



