118 Notices of Communications to the Society, of which 



Gardener, to bring it to perfection, and as the berries hang 

 loose on the bunch, it does not require so much thinning, as 

 many other kinds. 



At this Meeting, a Queen Pine of great beauty, and su- 

 perior flavour, was received from Mr. Thomas Baldwin, 

 Gardener to the Marquis of Hertford, at Ragley. It mea- 

 sured sixteen inches in circumference, seven inches in length, 

 and weighed four pounds. The size and excellence of this 

 fruit were remarkable, when it is considered that the plant 

 on which it was produced was little more than fifteen months 

 old. The method of thus expeditiously bringing the fruit 

 to perfection is applicable only to the Queen Pine : Mr. 

 Baldwin keeps the suckers in tan, under a frame, without 

 fire, until they are well rooted, when they are removed into 

 the fruiting house, and bear freely in the second season. 

 The sucker which produced the above fruit, was taken off 

 in the beginning of July 1816 ; it was put into a small pot 

 of about six inches diameter, and plunged into tan, as above 

 described ; it continued therein till the end of September 

 following, when it was shifted into a pot of nine inches di- 

 ameter, and removed to the fruiting house, where it fruited 

 at the end of the succeeding September. 



At this Meeting also, Specimens of the D'Auch and Colmar 

 Pears were shewn, sent together from the Royal Gardens at 

 Kew, to illustrate the difference of the two sorts. They have 

 been supposed to be the same fruit, and (since the French 

 writers do not mention the D'Auch Pear) this opinion has 

 been very prevalent ; but the difference is sufficiently mani- 

 fest. The D'Auch Pear ripens a fortnight later than the other ; 

 it is more highly flavoured, and has yellowish flesh, the Col- 

 mar being internally of a greenish white. In the D'Auch Pears 



