13 



against walls is thus given by Rogers Scliabol. A 

 cultivator of Montreuil having by chance thrown a 

 peach against a wall with a south aspect, it grew up 

 and produced fruit, which, from the shelter and heat 

 of the wall, were found to be larger, more succulent, 

 and of better flavour, than those produced on stand- 

 ard trees. This cultivator, seeing that the heat of 

 the wall was favourable to the peach, fastened the 

 shoots to it with nails and ties, and found the fruit 

 still larger and better. In wdiat year this cultivator 

 lived is not stated ; but he is considered as much 

 more likely to be the inventor than Girardot, who 

 lived in the time of Louis XIV., when training the 

 peach had already been practised at Montreuil suiS- 

 ciently long to produce young Pepin, who w^as the 

 pupil of his father, already celebrated for training the 

 peach. {Annates d' Horticulture xix.) 



The deserved celebrity of Montreuil for peaches 

 still continues ; but although many have, no doubt, 

 heard of Peches de Montreuil, Figues d'Argenteuil, 

 x\bricots de Triel, and Raisins de Fontainebleau, yet, 

 perhaps, few have ever visited these places. It is 

 generally known that French gardeners' delight is 

 " specialities when they find any kind of culture 

 particularly lucrative, or when the soil and air of one 

 place is more congenial than another, that they almost 

 invariably abandon a general trade or unfavourable 

 situation, and direct all their energies to that one 



