UISTOEY OF TUE APPLK. - '43 



assumes, the first apples that were produced from seeds 

 brought over by the early emigrants, yielded inferior 

 fruit, which had run back toward tlie wild state, and the 

 people were forced to begin again with them, and that 

 they most naturally pursued this very plan, taking seeds 

 from the improving varieties for tlie next generations and 

 80 on. This may have been so, but it is mere assumption 

 — we have no proof, and, on the contrary, our choice va- 

 rieties have so generally been conceded to have been 

 chance seedlings, that there appears little evidence to 

 support it — on the contrary, some very fine varieties have 

 been produced by selecting the seeds of good sorts pro- 

 miscuously, and without regarding the age of the trees 

 from which tlie fruit was taken. Mr. Downing himself 

 after telling us that wc have much encouragement to ex- 

 periment upon this plan of perfecting fruits, by takino- 

 seeds from such as arc not quite riijc, gathered from a 

 seedling of promising quality, from a healtliy young tree 

 (quite young,) on its own root, not grafted, and that we 

 "must avoid 1st, tiie seeds of old trees; 2d, those, of 

 grafted trees ; 3d, that we must have the best grounds for 

 good results "—still admits what we all know, that " in 

 this country, new varieties of rare excellence are some- 

 times obtained at once by planting the seeds of old grafted 

 varieties ; thus the Lawrence Favorite and the Columbia 

 Plums were raised from seeds of the Green Gage, one of 

 the oldest European varieties." 



Let us now look at an iibsoluto experiment conducted 

 avowedly upoii tiic Van Moiis plan in our own country, 

 upon the fortile soil of llie State of Illinoi.s, aud see to 

 what results it led : — 



