544 



THE APPLE. 



lay them in heaps in cool dry cellars, and cover tliem with abundance of 

 straw. In some parts of England they are preserved in ridges, the apples 

 being laid on, and covered with, green turf or straw, and the ridge finished 

 with a foot or more of soil to keep out the frost, in the same manner as is 

 done in keeping potatoes in ridges or hods. By this mode they keep per- 

 fectly ; but it is evidently better adapted for a market gardener who sells his 

 produce in large quantities, than for a gentleman's gardener who has to furnish 

 small portions of fruit daily. For him, shelves or the cellar-floor are to be- 

 preferred during the winter, and jars during the spring and summer months. 



The French crab, the northern greening, and various other long keeping 

 sorts, may be preserved in dry sand, on a large scale in cellars, or in ridges (or 

 hods or pies, as they are called in some places), or on a small scale in jars kept 

 in cellars, for two years or upwards. The French crab may also be kept on 

 shelves in a garret for two years ; but by this mode it is always more or less 

 shrivelled. What is termed the sweating of apples, consists in covering 

 them with short grass, aftermath hay, mats, or blankets, or any similar 

 covering, so as to excite a degree of fermentation, the heat produced by 

 which expands the water in the apple, and causes it to exude through the 

 pores of the skin. This takes place sooner or later, according to the tempe- 

 rature of the atmosphere, but generally, in a fruit-cellar at 40°, in the course 

 of a week or ten days, after which the apples are wiped, and being thus 

 deprived of a portion of their moisture, it is thought they will keep better. 

 This ma}'- be true where they are kept on shelves, exposed to a change of 

 air ; but the natural moisture of the apple is no impediment to its keeping 

 in any situation where the air and the temperature are not, or but very 

 slightly, changed. — (See 858 and 930.) 



1153. Diseases, Insects, Casualties, 8)C. — No tree is more subject to the 

 canker than the apple, and particularly some kinds, such as the Ribston 

 pippin, Hawthornden, &c. Practically, the canker may be considered in- 

 curable ; but it may always be prevented, or its appearance deferred, by pro- 

 curing young trees which are free from it, and taking care not to plant them 

 too deep, or to dig deep round them afterwards, so as to force the roots to pene- 

 trate into the subsoil. The canker is not only produced by too deep planting, by 

 deep digging, in cultivating the ground round the tree, and by a wet or otherwise 

 unfavourable subsoil, but by a late climate or a late season, in which the wood 

 is not properly ripened. To facilitate the ripening of the wood in a bad cli- 

 mate, nothing is better than to prevent the tree from making much wood to 

 ripen ; and this may be effected by keeping the soil poor rather than rich, 

 by planting on hillocks above the surface, and by never stirring the soil more 

 than an inch or two in depth, for a space round the tree equal to, or rather 

 more than, that covered by its branches. The woolly aphis, or American 

 blight, is the most injurious insect that infests the apple tree, but it is also 

 that which is most easily destroyed. This is effected by washing the parts 

 with diluted sulphuric acid ; which is formed by mixing f oz. by measure of the 

 sulphuric acid of the shops with 7^ ozs. of water. It should be rubbed into 

 the parts affected by means of a piece of rag tied to a stick, the operator 

 taking care not to let it touch his clothes. The same mixture appKed all 

 over the bark of the tree will effectually destroy mosses and lichens. 

 After the bark of a tree has been washed with this mixture, the first shower 

 will re-dissolve it, and convey it into the most minute crevice, so as effec- 

 tually to destroy any insects that may have escaped. ( G. M. vol. IX., p. 336.) 



