1204 Relation of Color to Flavor in Fruits & Vegetables. | December, 
of a fruit, through selection, we can eliminate acid and solidity, 
or if by darkening the flesh of another fruit, already too tender 
and insipid, in the same way, we can heighten its characteristic 
flavor, and increase its firmness, we have gained a new faculty in 
the work of making the products of nature subservient to our 
wants. 
The hypothesis was therefore assumed, that in a white flesh, in 
fruits and vegetables, we escape solidity, and a strongly marked 
characteristic flavor, with a gain, or at least without a loss, of 
sweetness, This hypothesis was applied to the fruits and vege- 
tables of which I have been able to find complete descriptions. 
The results of my researches will be given further on. 
If the law exists which my hypothesis assumes, it is evident 
that the processes of selection have operated more or less to 
obliterate the marks by which it may be traced. Seedlings or 
sports yielding fruits having a very harsh or acid flavor have been 
rejected, whatever the color of their flesh. On the contrary, 
deep colored samples possessing a pleasant flavor, though excep- 
tions to the law, have been preserved. Thus in many cases we 
are compelled to trace out the law with but half of the evidence. 
For example, the blood clingstone peach, which is said by Mr. 
Downing to have flesh “ very red, like that of the beet,” is pro- 
nounced “ not fit for eating.” Red fleshed peaches are very rarely 
mentioned in our fruit books. Possibly the reason why so few 
red fleshed varieties have been preserved is, that their flavor and 
firmness were such as to make them undesirable. ` 
We may fairly assume that palatability has been a leading prin- 
ciple in selection, and that the color of flesh has had influence 
only in a few cases where appearance is of some importance. In 
the currant, the principal use of which is in the manufacture of 
jelly, the red color is preferable, because, as every one koos 
the rich crimson color of jelly made from red currants 15 more 
attractive than the pale color of that made from the white cuf- 
rant, though it is equally well known the latter has decidedly the 
milder flavor. So in the beet and carrot, the rich colors of the 
deep red varieties of the one, and orange sorts of the other, ae 
more desirable for the table than the paleness of the milder watt 
varieties; and further, as there is no acid in these roots to over 
come in their amelioration, their agreeable characteristic flavo® 
are more developed in the deeper fleshed varieties. In the 
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