210 



NEW VARIETY OF PEAR. 



XIL 



On a new variety of Pear. By Thomas Andrew Knight, 



Es(j,F.R.S.Sfc*. 



Remarks on 

 the ripening 

 of the pear. 



We have no 

 good whiter 

 )<oars that are 



smudards. 



But such 

 iijigtitbe ob- 

 tained, 

 and the pear*; 

 sold as cheap 

 as apples. 



AD the pear been recently introduced into England 

 from a climate similar to that of the south of France, in 

 which it had been found to ripen in the months of August 

 and September, and to become fit for the dessert in the 

 four succeeding months, it might have been inferred, with 

 little apparent danger of errour, that the same fruit would 

 ripen here in October, and be fit for our tables during win- 

 ter ; provided its blossoms proved suiTfciently hardy to set 

 in our climate. But had many varieties of this fruit been 

 proved by subsequent experience to be capable of acquiring 

 maturity before the conclusion of our summer, and in the 

 early part of the autumn, without the aid of a wall, scarcely 

 any doubts could have been entertained of the facility of 

 obtaining numerous varieties, which would ripen well on 

 standard trees to supply our tables during winter ; for it 

 would be very extraordinary, if the whole of our summer, 

 and of our long, and generally warm autumn, would not ef- 

 fect that, which a part of our summer alone had been 

 proved to be capable of effecting; nevertheless, though 

 varieties of the pear abound, which bear and ripen well in 

 the early part of the autumn, we possess scarcely any good 

 winter pears, which do not require an east or west wall, i» 

 the warmer parts of England, and a south wall in the 

 colder parts. This can arise only from the want of va- 

 rieties ; and I venture most coniidently to predict, that 

 (if proper experiments be made to form such varieties) win- 

 ter pears, of equal merits with those which now grow on our 

 best walls, will be obtained in the utmost abundance from 

 standard trees ; and ihat such pears may be sold with suffi- 

 cient profit to the grower, on as low terms as apples are now 

 sold, during winter : for I have had several opportunities 

 of observing, that the fruit of seedling pear trees generally 

 bears a considerable resemblance to that of their parent 

 trees ; and the experiments I have made on other species 



* Trans, of the Horticultural Society, vol. I, p. 178. 



of 



