NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



41 



THE PEACH. 



The peach Ls the most hiscious of all fruits, and 

 it is adapted to extensive cultiire. It is raised to a 

 moderate extent in the Xorthern and Southern States, 

 and it seems admirably adapted to the middle region 

 of our country, where there are produced on some 

 single farms ten to twenty thousand bushels a year. 



In the north, this fruit is rather uncertain, not so 

 much from the destruction of the trees by severe 

 winters, — though this occurs occasionally, — as from 

 the loss of buds ; and these would not be so liable to 

 be destroyed, were our winters of even temperature ; 

 but in the coldest months in the year, we sometimes 

 have a spring-like day, or a week of mild weather, 

 which starts the buds, and renders them very suscep- 

 tible of injury from cold that suddenly ensues. 



The interesting communication of Gen. Newhall, 

 on another page, shows how to obviate this difficulty, 

 in a small way ; and by the means he recommends, 

 the peach culture may be extended one hundred and 

 fifty miles north of its present limit. We ought also 

 to make improvements so as to render the peach cul- 

 ture, on an extensive scale, profitable, not only in 

 this section, but still farther north. 



For many years, most of the peach stones planted 

 in this region, and farther north, have been raised in 

 the south. Many trees, set in New England, are raised 

 in a more southern clime, and with a luxuriant 

 jjrowth that renders them tender ; and in addition to 



these disadvantages, most of the scions used in bud- 

 ding have been from kinds foreign to this climate. 



Some say, all these things make no difference ; but 

 those who have bought knowledge dearly in the 

 school of experience, do not confirm such statement. 

 It might as Avell be said that an Ethiopian is as well 

 prepared to endure the rigorous cold of Greenland 

 as a native of that frozen region, as that southern 

 trees, and those that have originated in a mild, for- 

 eign clime, are adapted to the north. 



As the peach has travelled, from a climate of per- 

 petual verdure, thus far north, generally enduring 

 the changeable winters and occasionally severe cold 

 of the Middle States, and often enduring the severe 

 test of a northern freeze, several degrees below zero, 

 we have reason to suppose, that, by good manage- 

 ment, it will bear extension still farther north. At 

 another time we may continue the subject. Our 

 readers will be pleased to have the opinions of others 

 also. 



Spare minutes are the gold dust of time ; and 

 Young was writing a true, as well as a striking line, 

 when he affirmed that, " Sands made the mountain, 

 and moments made the year." Of all the portions of 

 our life, the spare minutes are the most faithful in 

 good or evil. They are gaps through which tempta- 

 tions find the easiest access to the garden. 



