PRODUCTION OF NEW VARIETIES. 17 



those which, from the appearance of the wood and leaf, he 

 had reason to believe would be most likely to give the best 

 fruit. As soon as the first of these bore, he selected the best, 

 and planted the seeds. Selections were again made from the 

 first of these, and so on in continued succession, the best and 

 soonest in bearing were uniformly chosen. He thus obtained 

 fruit from the eighth generation ; each successive experiment 

 yielding an improved result on the preceding. He had, in the 

 early part of this series of experiments, no less than eighty 

 thousand trees ; hence, in selecting from so large a number, 

 his chance for fine sorts was far greater than from a small col- 

 lection ; and hence too the reason why, after seven or eight 

 improving generations, he had obtained so many good varie- 

 ties. In the early stages of his operations, he found " that 

 twelve or fifteen years was the mean term of time from the 

 moment of planting the first seed of an ancient variety of the 

 domestic pear, to the first fructification of the trees which 

 sprang from them." When his seedlings were at the age of 

 three or four years, he was able to judge of their appearances 

 though they had not as yet borne ; such only were taken for 

 further trial as exhibited the strongest probability of excel- 

 lence. It is hardly necessary to remark that in all these 

 trials the young trees were kept in the highest state of culti- 

 vation. 



Van Mons maintained that by selecting and planting the 

 seeds of the first crop on the young tree, the product would 

 be less liable to turn back to the original variety than where 

 the seeds were taken from the fruit of an old-bearing or 

 grafted tree ; and to this practice he chiefly ascribed his suc- 

 cess. The many instances, however, of fine seedlings from 

 old grafted sorts throw a shade of doubt over this theory. 

 There is scarcely a question that the same extent of labor 

 expended in crossing varieties would have given greater 

 success. 



New Varieties by Crossing. 



New varieties are produced in crossing by pollinating the 

 stigma of one with the pollen from another, as described in 

 the preceding chapter. The simplest instance which occurs 

 is that of the strawberry, the pistillate varieties of which 



3 



