7G4 



HORTICULTURE 



HORTICULTURE 



inj;; of apple.s since the tii'.st settieinpiit vt thu countrj'. 

 Early in the last century there ajipenrs to have been a 

 ^'reat abundance of the fruit; but in 1821 Thacher de- 

 •dared that "it i.s a remarkable fact that the first 

 planters bequeathed to their posterity a greater number 

 of orchards, in proportion to their popuhvtiou. than are 

 now to be found in the old colony," aiul he attributes 

 the decline in orcharding largely to the encroachment 

 of the "poisonous liquor" of the later times. Under the 

 inspiration of Thacher, Cose, Kenrick, Prince, Manning, 

 and the Downings, orchards were again planted, and we 

 are just now in another period of decline in the East, 

 following the decay of these plantations. 



Apples were carried far into the frontiers by the In- 

 dians and probably also by the French missionaries, and 

 the "Indian apple orcliards " are still known in many 

 localities even east of the Mississippi {see also, Apple- 

 .seed, JoJinrjij). At the opening of the century, the 

 Early Harvest, Newtown Pippin, Swaar, Spitzenbex-g. 

 Rhode Island Greening, Yellow Bellefleur, Roxbnry 

 Russet, and other familiar apples of American origin 

 were widely disseminated and much esteemed. Apples 

 had begun to be planted by settlers in Ohio before ]800. 

 In 1817, Coxe could recommend a list of "one hundred 

 kinds of the most estinuible apples cultivated in our 

 country;" and in 1825 William Prince oflered IIG varie- 

 ties for sale — at 'M% cents per tree — of which 17 were 

 set aside — after the fashion of the time- as particularly 

 adapted to the making of cider. Of these 116 varieties, 

 111 were considered to be of American origin. In 1872, 

 Downing's list of apples which hud l)een fruited and 

 described in America, had swelled to l8oG varieties, of 

 which 1099 were of known American origin. Of this 

 great inventory, probably not over a third were actually 

 ill cultivation at any one time, and very many of them 

 are now lost. Yet the apple is still our most important 

 fruit, and 878 varieties were actually offered for sale by 

 tlie nurserymen of North America in 1892. 



There has been amost noticeable tendency towards the 

 origination of varieties of apples in this country, and 

 the consequent exclusion of varieties of European ori- 

 gin. As early as 1700, cions of American varieties were 

 sent to England. Before the Revolution, ajtples were 

 exported. The origination of indigenous varieties was 

 of course, an accidental one, and was a necessary result 

 of the universal method of growing apple trees directly 

 from seeds, and top-grafting them in case they should 

 turn out profitless. A critical study of American Horti- 

 <mlture will show that all species of plants which have 

 been widely cultivated in this country have gradually 

 run into indigenous varieties, and. the whole body of our 

 domesticated flora has undergone a progressive evolu- 



tion and adaptation without our knowing it. By far the 

 greater number cf the apples of the older apple-growing 

 regions of the country are indigenous varieties, and the 

 same process is now operating in the Northwest, where 

 the American seedlings of the Russian stock are prov- 

 ing to be more valuahle than the original importations. 



1086. Dufour's picture of Grape training (1826J. 



Patterned after the South- European fashion of employing mulberry troos for supports 



1087, Bartram's cider mill, a relic of the last century. 



It is said that the apples were placed in the circular groove 

 in the rock and crushed by means of a weight rolling over 

 them. The juice ran out the gutter at the farther side and 

 was caught in a rock-hewn cistem. 



Pears were amongst the earliest fruits introduced into 

 the New World, and the French, particularly, dissemi- 

 nated them far and wide along the waterways, as wit- 

 nessed by the patriarchid trees of the Detroit river and 

 portions of the IMississippi system. John Bartram's 

 Petre pear (Fig. 1080) is one of the patriarchs of the 

 last century, although the tree is not large. The first 

 book devoted exclusively to the pear was Field's, pub- 

 lished in 1859. The Japanese type of pears had been 

 brought into the country from two and perhaps three 

 separate introductions, early in the fifties, but they had 

 not gained sufficient prominence to attract Field's atten- 

 tion. From this oriental stock has come a race of prom- 

 ising hybrids with the common pear, represented chiefly 

 by the Kieffer, Le Conte and Gar- 

 ber. 



Peaches were early introduced 

 into the New Worhl by various 

 colonists, and they thrived so well 

 that they soon became spontaneous, 

 Nuttall found them naturalized in 

 the forests of Arkansas in 1819, and 

 the species now grows with all the 

 lustirious abandon of a native in 

 waste and forest lands from Georgia 

 and the Oaroliuas to the westward 

 of the Mississippi. There is prob- 

 ably no country in the world in 

 which peaches grow and bear so 

 freely as in the United States. The 

 old Spanish or Melocoton type is 

 now the most popular race of 

 peaches, giving rise to the Craw- 

 fords and their derivatives. 



Of late years there has been a 

 conti-action of the original peach 

 areas, an<l many good people have 

 thought that the climate is grow- 

 ing uncongenial, but it is only the 

 natural result of the civilization of 

 the countrv and the change in 

 methods of' Horticulture. Peaches 

 had never been an industry, but 

 the orchards were planted here and 

 there as very minor appendages to 



