CROPS AND PROFITS. 155 



from such furtive errand, with a basket laden from 

 the fruiterer's stock, carefully hidden under their 

 skirts ; and I have gone my way (pretending not to 

 see it all), humming to myself, 



car-pent tua poma nepotes ! 



Want of success in orcharding is more often 

 attributable to want of care, than to any other want 

 whatever. There are, indeed, particular belts of 

 land which seem to favor the apple, where, with 

 only moderate cultivation, they are free from leaf 

 blight, comparatively free from insect depredators, 

 and fruit with certainty. There are other regions, 

 and these, so far as I have observed, warm soils 

 inclining to a sandy or gravelly loam, in which the 

 apple does not show vigor, except under extraor- 

 dinary attention, and in which the whole insect tribe 

 seems doubly pestiferous. 



The pear is by no means so capricious ; it will 

 thrive in a heavy loam ; it will thrive in light sand ; 

 the borer does not attack its root ; the caterpillar 

 moth does not fasten its eggs (or very rarely) upon its 

 twigs ; the apple-moth spares a large proportion of 

 its fruit. But even the pear, without care and culti- 

 vation, will disappoint ; and the farmer who neglects 

 any crop, will find, sooner or later, that whatever is 

 worth planting, is worth planting well ; whatever is 



