THE GINKGO. 



See illustra 



THE GINKGO is well known in this country 

 as an ornamental tree, but few have ever 

 looked upon it as possessing any possibili- 

 ties as a fruit-bearing tree. Professor 

 Georgeson's account of the use of the fruit of it in 

 Japan, on a succeeding page, calls attention to it in a 

 forcible manner. The first one in this country to call 

 attention to its possibilities as a fruit tree, so far as 

 we know, was Professor Sargent, who wrote in 1877 

 (Gardener's Monthly, xix, 358) that "the cultiva- 

 tion of the Ginkgo for its fruit is one of the possibili- 

 ties of American horticulture, and is, perhaps, 

 worth consideration." At that time but one tree 

 apparently had borne in this country, and this had 

 been planted about twenty years before upon the 

 grounds of the Kentucky Military Institute at Farm- 

 dale, Kentucky. Fruiting specimens are now of 

 frequent occurrence. The illustration, page 271, is 

 made from specimens obtained from a large tree 

 growing upon the grounds of Ellwanger & Barry. 

 This tree was planted about i860. It is now fifty 

 feet high, and has a circumference at the base of six 

 feet. It began bearing about three years ago, and 

 has averaged about a peck of fruit each year since. 

 The tree stands alone, and it therefore appears that 

 the specimens must be moncecious or polygamous, 

 rather than dicecious as described in the books. The 

 ruit has been long known m France, and twenty-five 

 years ago the seed was coming to this country. 



The fruit has a strong resemblance to a small 

 greenish-yellow plum, even to the stone. The de- 

 tached fruits in the engraving and the separate stone 

 are full size. This stone has a hard and smooth 

 shell, and is filled with a pleasant and nutty meat. 

 The pistillate catkins are two-flowered, but usually 

 only one fruit develops. The projection upon the 

 peduncle indicates the position of the aborted fruit. 

 The fruit spurs are well illustrated in this engrav- 

 ing. The specimen figured by Professor Georgeson 

 {page 268) is a portion of a young and vigorous 

 shoot. 



The leaves in Professor Georgeson's figure are 

 also different from those on the fruiting specimen, 

 being cleft in the middle and bearing erose and cre- 

 nate borders and a more spreading base. This is 

 the difference between the leaves of young shoots 

 and those of the old and fruit-bearing ones. This 



•n, page 271. 



variation in leaf characters recalls the geologic his- 

 tory of the ginkgo, for it appears to be true that 

 leaves upon the young and vigorous shoots of trees 

 are more like their ancestors than are the leaves 

 upon old plants or less vigorous shoots, as if there 

 is some such genealogical record in leaves as there 

 is in the development of embryos in animals. At 

 any rate, it appears that the early ginkgos had dis- 

 tinctly lobed or even much-cut leaves. Ginkgos were 

 once a numerous tribe, and they grew plentifully in 

 North America, but the type is now reduced to this 

 one survivor in Eastern Asia. Our ginkgo is a rem- 

 nant of an early type of vegetation, and we always 

 look upon it with a feeling akin to reverence and 

 sadness. It is an isolated monument of the gro- 

 tesque vegetation of the Mesozoic time. 



For ornamental use, the tree is most desirable ; 

 its capacities for fruiting remain to be shown. The 

 noble beauty it possesses can only be the more in 

 its favor if it proves to be valuable economically in 

 fruit bearing. 



A Fictitious Plant. The Faseolus of the Ortus 

 Sanitatis. (See page 260.) 



