CHAPTER XX 
ORIGIN OF CULTIVATED FRUITS! 
The apple. The pear-The plum. The sour cherry: The peach- The 
apricot: The orange. and the lemon. The banana: The pineapple - The 
grape . The strawberry - The raspberry - The blackberry - The melon. 
Miscellaneous fruits 
The list of fruits is an exceedingly long one. What we popu- 
larly call a fruit is, in general, not the seed, but rather the fleshy 
developed parts about the seed or seeds. For example, in the 
apple the whole pericarp or seed envelope takes on an extreme 
development, entirely and somewhat uniformly surrounding the 
seed capsules with a juicy fleshy growth. In the strawberry it 
is the receptacle on which the mass of seeds is attached that 
develops into the edible part. In the raspberry each individual 
seed is surrounded by a juicy growth similar to that of the peach, 
while the receptacle is left behind as the fruit leaves it, like a 
cap comes off the head. In the blackberry each seed develops 
its fleshy envelope, like the raspberry, but the receptacle comes 
off with the fruit, as in the strawberry. 
The apple (Malus malus). This best of all the fruits has 
been long in cultivation, specimens of several varieties having 
been found in the remains of the lake dwellers, previous to the 
bronze age. These were small fruits, however, measuring only 
from an inch to an inch and a quarter in diameter and undoubt- 
edly gathered from the wild. The fruit has therefore improved 
somewhat since these days, certainly in size and most likely in 
flavor as well. 
The apple was cultivated by the Greeks under the name of 
melon and by the Latins as malus, clearly the same name ; but 
1 See “ Principles of Breeding,” chapter on Mutation; also “ Evolution of 
our Native Fruits,” by Bailey. 
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