STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 43 



Applks, 



'" Anis. — This is the leading apple of the Volga, the apple tree 

 most highly prized, most largely grown. To the inquiry, which are 

 your most profitable varieties ? the reply invariabh' was Anis, I think, 

 iuvariabl}', my notes show no exception nor do I remember one. 

 Such was the verdict in all the orchards of the different towns and 

 villages between Kazan and Saratof. We first met with it in that 

 curious semi-oriental bazaar, the Nijni Novgorod fair. Here we find 

 the Russian peasant orchardist bi'inging large quantities of it to the 

 bazaar in bark boxes, usually willow bark boxes, holding about three 

 bnshels. 



In the southern part of the Government of Kazan, in latitude 55, 

 the same latitude as Moscow, but 430 miles to the east of it, in a 

 continental climate, a climate of extremes, and yet 600 miles nearer 

 the North Pole than the City of Quebec, there are twelve villages 

 where the peasant proprietors are apple growers, the chief industry 

 in fact is apple growing. When we were there the little trees were 

 loaded with fruit, yet the thermometer had been down to forty below- 

 zero the winter previous. Five years before, during one da\', the 

 temperature on these exposed loess bluffs was — 40 Reaumur, or 58 

 below zero by Fahrenheit's thermometer. These low temperatures, 

 howevei', do not seem verified by the meteorological records in the 

 City of Kazan. Hearing of these low temperatures I looked for 

 winter injury to the trees, but did not find any traces of it. 



In answer to the quei-y, which is the hardiest api^le tree you have 

 the tree that has stood best the most trying winters? the answer, I 

 believe, always was Anis. The general idea there is that it is of all 

 kinds known, the apple tree that can be grown the farthest North, 

 except what the}- call the Chinese apple, or as we would saj', the 

 Siberian crab, and these crabs, which are not common, are true 

 Siberian Prunifolias, and not less hard}' hybrids. In these villages 

 the apple is grown, in a good season, certainly to the value of $50,000. 

 In this, the coldest profitable orchard region in the world, the Anis 

 is noted as their hardiest tree. 



Man}- species of trees become dwarfed towards the northern limit 

 of their growth. The most northern pines and spruces, birches 

 and poplars, are but little shrubs ; in the same way we find this 

 Anis in Kazan, especially when growing on thin soil and without 



