256 THE PLUMS OF NEW YORK. 



Jefferson has long been popular in America and is highly spoken of 

 by English, French and German pomologists as well, possibly ranking 

 highest in the Old World of all Domesticas which have had their origin 

 in America. The popularity of the variety is waning, however, chiefly 

 because it is lacking in the essentials demanded in a market fruit. There 

 can be no question as to the standing of Jefferson as to quality it is one 

 of the best of all dessert plums. Grown under favorable conditions and 

 when fully ripe, it is a golden-yellow with a delicate blush and bloom, 

 large for a plum in the Reine Claude group, a well-turned oval in shape, 

 withal one of the handsomest plums. The color-plate maker did not 

 do it justice. It fails as a market variety because the trees are late in 

 coming in bearing, not always certain in bearing, a little particular 

 as to soils and not quite hardy though one of the hardiest of all Reine 

 Claudes. Both tree and fruit are too delicate for the market -grower and 

 the market -men. As to its value for private places and fruit connoisseurs 

 there can be no doubt it is one of the choicest. It would seem that there 

 should be a place for Jefferson for the fancy trade in the markets, as it 

 would grace the show-window of any delicatessen store ; but unfortunately 

 there are few fruit-growers in America to cater to such a trade. 



Jefferson was raised by a Judge Buel, Albany, New York, about 1825. 

 The originator presented a tree of this variety to the Massachusetts Hor- 

 ticultural Society in 1829, and in 1841 trees were given to the London 

 Horticultural Society which fruited in 1845. The parentage of the variety 

 is unknown; Floy thought it was a seedling of Washington; Elliott sug- 

 gested that it was " from a seed of Coe's Golden Drop, which in growth 

 and wood, it closely resembles." In 1852, the American Pomological 

 Society placed this variety on its catalog list of fruits worthy of general 

 cultivation. 



Tree medium to large, vigorous, spreading, open-topped, hardy at Geneva, productive ; 

 branches ash-gray, smooth, with small, numerous, lenticels; branchlets slender, short ) 

 with long internodes, greenish-red changing to dark brownish-red, dull, lightly pubes- 

 cent, with inconspicuous, small lenticels; leaf -buds large, long, pointed, appressed. 



Leaves folded upward, obovate, one and three-quarters inches wide, three and three- 

 quarters inches long, thick; upper surface sparingly pubescent, with a grooved midrib; 

 lower surface yellowish-green, pubescent; apex and base acute, margin serrate, with 

 small, dark glands; petiole three-quarters inch long, tinged purplish-red along one side, 

 glandless or with from one to three small, globose, yellowish glands usually on the stalk. 



Season of bloom medium, short; flowers appearing after the leaves, one and one- 

 eighth inches across, white; borne on lateral spurs, singly or in pairs; pedicels three- 



