CULTUEE TTNDEE GLASS. 



245 



peaches, houses 12ft. wide and 12ft. or 14ft. high are more suitable. 

 Early peaches, flowering in November ajid December, require all the 

 Bcanty rays of the sun to enable them to set freely. Less importance 

 is, however, now placed upon the mere form of roof than used to be 

 the case ; still, there can be no doubt the form of the house may prove either 

 a help ^i a hindrance to early peach culture. More direct sunlight and 

 heat will pass through a roof at an angle of 45deg. than through one of 

 30deg. Consequently, the former is the best for an early peach house ; 

 the latter the more suitable for a late one. The wider the house, and 

 the less the difference between the height of the front and back wall, the 





Tib. 66. 



flatter the roof ; the narrower and greater the difference between the two 

 walls, tiie sharper the angle of elevation. This is well shown in the glass 

 peach case (Fig. 52). 



The wider houses also afford more apace, and are less liable to extremes 

 of temperature. The latter is more dangerous in peach culture than 

 with almost any other fruit. The flowers often faU in showers after any 

 sudden and severe elevation of temperature. The embryo fruit are almost 

 equally liable to wither up or shrivel from the same cause ; while during 

 the stoning period any excess of heat favours the casting of the fruit in 

 a very wholesale manner. Houses of considerable area, with ample 

 ventilation, are the surest antidotes against extremes of heat and cold. 



