CHAPTER XIV 



THE PLUM 

 Culture on Walls 

 By OWEN THOMAS 



The Wild Sloe and Bullace are indigenous to this country, and in all probability 

 the only ones that are natives, but like the wild crab-apple they have furnished 

 stocks for every variety of their ovirn species ; this fruit appears to have been 

 attended to in early days, if we may judge from the variety that Gerarde had in 

 his garden in Holborn in 1597. "I have," says he, "three score sorts in my 

 garden, and all strange and rare ; there be in many other places many more 

 common, and yet cometh to our hands others not before known. The greatest 

 varieties of these rare plums are to be found in the grounds of Master Richard 

 Pointer of Twickenham." The damson or Damascene plum takes its name from 

 Damascus, where it grows in great quantities, and whence it was brought into 

 Italy about 114 years B.C. Speaking of the greengage the same authority says : 

 " This latter plum was called the Reine Claude, from having been introduced 

 into France by the Queen Claude, wife to Francis the First of that country, 

 but it bears various names in different parts of France." It is often called 

 " Damas Vert" ; at Rouen, where it grows abundantly, they call it "La Verte 

 Bonne." Lord Cromwell brought several sorts of plums from Italy into this 

 country in the reign of Henry VII. Thus has the plum given pleasure and 

 administered to the wants of man from time immemorial up to the present 

 day. 



Whether considered as a fruit for dessert, cooking, or preserving, the plum 

 is of great importance and value. Most varieties in cultivation at the 

 present time may be successfully grown in the orchard or in the open garden, 

 and where the object is to grow the fruit for market these are the methods to 

 adopt. But there are some varieties of the very highest merit that can only be 

 successfully grown where the trees are planted against walls. 



Few of our hardy fruits present less difficulties in their culture than the 

 plum. Planted against a wall it will succeed equally well exposed to any 

 aspect, and this is a valuable attribute, as the season of the best dessert varieties 

 can be so much prolonged by planting trees on diiFerent aspects. For instance, 

 take the many varieties of gages (and as long as we can secure these for dessert 

 few lovers of the plum will wish for any other); by planting the old greengage, 

 and, what is better still as regards richness of flavour and earliness, Denniston's 

 Superb, on a south wall, ripe gages may be had in August, and if a few trees 



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