54 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Jan. 



If he now thinks he is correct in his assertion 

 about "consequence and concomitant," let him 

 bring forward his facts, ocular developments, or 

 authority, to disprove the result of investigation 

 as declared by Mr. Flint, Smithsonian Institute, 

 Congressional Committee, U. S. Patent Office, 

 Dr. Harris and Prof. Agassiz. 



Baltimore, Dec. 1, 1860. Ltman Reed. 



Remarks. — The subject of the cause and the 

 cure of the potato rot has been carefully discussed 

 in our columns, — its importance inducing us to 

 give it an extended space. Under the present 

 circumstances, we can see nothing to be gained 

 by continuing it, but whenever any new and 

 plausible theory is introduced, we shall be glad 

 to hear from our correspondents again. 



For the New England Farmer. 

 ••FKUITS AKD THEIR CULTTJilE." 



The Farmer of Nov. 24 contains some remarks 

 of John B. Moore, Esq., before the Concord 

 Farmers' Club. These remarks are in the main 

 to the point ; but the assertion that "nine-tenths" 

 of the pear trees planted within the last fifteen 

 years "have failed," I look upon as one of those 

 extravagances in which farmers are too apt to in- 

 dulge, when, from some local cause, they them- 

 selves happen to have failed in some fovorite en- 

 terprise. In the course of the last fifteen years, 

 I have planted about two hundred pear "trees. 

 They have been purchased indiscriminately, al- 

 most, at auction and in nurseries, whenever I 

 could find trees cheap. Some of them were of 

 foreign growth, and some native. Many of them 

 had been a long time out of the ground, and were 

 in bad order. They embrace from sixty to seventy 

 difi'erent varieties. And yet, out of the whole 

 lot, I have not lost half a dozen trees. 



I beg you will not understand me as recom- 

 mending the purchase of clicap trees. I believe 

 they are the dearest in the end. My course had 

 been guided by a desire to experiment upon dif- 

 ferent varieties — to test their adaptation to the 

 soil of my garden, and to the varying climate of 

 our seasons. And here permit m'e to confess, I 

 am but very little wiser now than I was ten or 

 fifteen years ago. I have learned something, to 

 be sure, of the nature and liabits of the pear tree, 

 in its different varieties. I can tell one kind from 

 another, in most cases, by the bark, the leaves, or 

 the form of growth. But I cannot tell to-day 

 which of fifty different kinds I would recommend 

 for cultivation, (leaving out of the account some 

 three or four standard varieties, such as the Bart- 

 lett, Bloodgood, and Duchesis de Angoulemc.) 



I had, a few years ago, a high opinion of that 

 noble old pear, Beurre Diel. I procured some 

 eight or ten handsome trees of that variety on 

 pear .stocks. _ Their growth was all I could desire, 

 both in thriftiness and beauty of shape. And yet, 

 although most of them have fruited for several 

 years, the quality has usually been insipid and 

 tasteless, while two or three scraggy little trees 

 of the same variety, on quince stocks, have borne 

 fruit of excellent quality. I had about made up 

 my mind, notwithstanding the beauty of these 

 pear stock Beurre Diels, to engraft them all with 



some other variety ; but fortunately, as I think, I 

 last Spring decided on giving them one year more 

 of grace. One of these trees, which has appar- 

 ently attained nearly its growth, as it threw out 

 no new shoots, gave me the past season a very 

 excellent quality of fruit, while those, which kept 

 on growing bore fruit of the old insipid kind, not 

 worth the gathering. From this I infer that some 

 varieties of pears must have time to mature the 

 tree before they can mature the fruit, and that it 

 will not do to condemn a tree on account of the 

 quality of the first, second, or even third year's 

 product. 



Last year, several trees (on quince,) of the 

 Beurre de Araalis vai'iety produced fruit of a fine 

 quality — almost, if not quite first rate. This year 

 the same variety produced a very large quantity of 

 large and handsome fruit, but if not exactly like 

 "apples of Sodom," which "please the eye, but 

 turn to ashes on the lip," it was so insipid and 

 tasteless as hardly to be worth the gathering. And 

 by the way, I think the extreme moisture of the 

 past season, while it served to develop very beau- 

 tiful pears, had an unfavorable effect upon their 

 quality generally. For instance, I had Duchess 

 pears weighing three quarters of a pound, and 

 beautiful to look at as the aforesaid "apples of 

 Sodom" in the most exalted state of poetic li- 

 cense ; and yet, the eating of them hardly paid 

 for the paring. The only exceptions that I know, 

 are the varieties known as L'Angelier and Sover- 

 ain d'Ete, the fruit of which proved better this 

 season than I ever knew it before. 



In the Farmer of December 8, you speak of 

 Dearborn's Seedling as a pear of "fir.st quality." 

 I have a tree of that variety which bears full crops 

 every year, and yet I could never pronounce it- a 

 pear of first, or even second rate quality. Last 

 year, the fruit came pretty well up to the standard 

 of a second rate fruit — perhaps nearly up to the 

 Bloodgood. But the present season the fruit has 

 not been good enough to give away. Still, from 

 its great productiveness, and the beautiful color 

 and form of the fruit, I would recommend all 

 amateurs to have one tree of this variety. For 

 a market fruit, I have no doubt it is one of the 

 most profitable. 



The general conclusion to which I have arrived, 

 from my comparatively brief experience in the 

 pear culture, as before indicated, is, that very lit- 

 tle dependence can be ])laced on a large portion 

 of the different varieties, until the trees, particu- 

 larly on pear stocks, have attained a somewhat 

 mature growth ; and that, even then, the fruit be- 

 comes so modified by the circumstances of sea- 

 son, soil and position, it is not safe to judge ex- 

 cept by the experience of a succession of seasons. 

 The ])ear culture, I have no doubt, may be made 

 immensely profitable ; but to succeed in it re- 

 quires time, patience, close observation, and a 

 soil adapted to its many and somewhat diverse 

 peculiarities. At any rate, the culture of fruit, 

 properly appreciated, is a soul-ennobling school, 

 in which, though there may be hard lessons in a 

 pecuniary sense, there are others of wisdom, and 

 goodness and happiness. E. C. P. 



Somerville, Mass. 



Remauks. — We are always pleased and in- 

 structed by the communications of "E. C. P.," 



