CROPS AND PROFITS. 147 



of winter fruit, I have decided very thoroughly in 

 the negative. Not that it cannot be grown with 

 sufficient care ; but that it can be grown far more 

 cheaply, and of a better quality, in other regions. 

 Summer fruit is not so long exposed to the depreda- 

 tions of insects, nor will it bear distant transporta- 

 tion. Its freshness too, gives it a virtue, and a 

 relishy smack, which warrant special pains-taking. 



I find in an old book of Gervase Markham's, 

 " The Countrie Farme " (based upon Liebault), that 

 the apple tree " loveth to have the inward part of his 

 wood moist and sweatie, so you must give him his 

 lodging in a fat, black, and moist ground ; and if it 

 be planted in a gravelly and sandie ground, it must 

 be helped with watering, and batling with dung and 

 Bmal moulde in the time of Autumne. It liveth and 

 continueth in all desirable good estate in the hills 

 and mountains where it may have fresh moisture, 

 being the thing that it searcheth after, but even 

 there it must stand in the open face of the South." 



The ruling is good now, with the exception per- 

 haps of exposure to the South, in regions liable to 

 late spring frosts. And whatever may be the advan- 

 tages of soil and of position, let no man hope for 

 large commercial results in apple-growing at the 

 East, without reckoning upon as thorough and as- 

 siduous culture as he would give to his corn crop ; 



