X INTRODUCTION. 



taken from the finest existing kinds ; but also that the 

 most handsome, the largest and the most perfectly 

 ripened specimens should be those that supply the seed. 

 A seedling plant will always partake more or less of the 

 character of its parent, the qualities of which are con- 

 centrated in the embryo when it has arrived at full 

 maturity. How this concentration takes place, we are as 

 ignorant as why certain constitutional peculiarities are 

 in men transferred from father to son, and from gene- 

 ration to generation ; but we know that it does take 

 place. Now if the general qualities of a given variety are 

 concentrated in the embryo under any circumstances, 

 it is reasonable to suppose that they will be most espe- 

 cially concentrated in a seed taken from that part of a 

 tree in which, its peculiar good qualities reside in the 

 highest degree. For instance, in the fruit of an apple 

 growing upon a north wall there is a smaller formation 

 of sugar than in the same variety growing on a south 

 wall -, and it can be easily understood that the seed of 

 that fruit which is itself least capable of forming 

 saccharine secretions, will acquire from its parent a less 

 power of the same nature than if it had been formed 

 within a fruit in which the saccharine principle was 

 abundant. It should therefore be always an object with 

 a gardener, in selecting a variety to become the parent 

 of a new sort, to stimulate that variety by every means 

 in his power to produce the largest and the most 

 fully ripened fruit that it is capable of bearing. The 

 importance of doing this is well known in regard to 

 Melons and Cucumbers, and also in preserving fugitive 

 varieties of flowers ; but it is not generally practised in 

 raising fruit trees. 



The power of procuring intermediate varieties by the 

 intermixture of the pollen and stigma of two different 

 parents is, however, that which most deserves consider- 

 ation. We all know that hybrid plants are constantly 



