232 The Principles of Fruit-growing. 
taught that varieties of fruit trees may be just as 
different and distinct in habit of growth as they are 
in kind of fruit, and that a first-class tree is a well- 
grown specimen which has the characteristics of the 
variety. It seems to me that it is time for nursery- 
men to begin to enforce this conception upon the 
public. Why may not a catalogue explain that a 
tree may be first-class and yet be crooked and 
gnarly? Why not place the emphasis upon health 
and vigor, and not upon mere shape and comeli- 
ness? And why may not a nurseryman give a list 
of those varieties which are comely growers, and 
another list of those which are wayward growers ?”* 
It is generally best to buy first-class trees,— 
those which are of medium size for their age, 
shapely in body and head, stocky, with straight, 
clean trunks and abundant roots, which are not 
stunted, and are free of borers and other injuries, 
and, in the case of budded trees, those in which 
the union is very near the ground; and the tree 
should show the natural characteristics of the va- 
riety. In dwarf pears, especially, it is important that 
the stock, to be first-class, shall be budded very 
low. It is often thought that large size is of itself 
a great merit in a nursery tree, but this is an 
error. Vigor, cleanness, stockiness, firm, hard 
growth, are much more important than _ bigness. 
The toughest and best trees are usually those of 
medium size. The very small extra expense which 
*¢The Survival of the Unlike,” p. 246. 
