EARLY PEACHES AND NECTARINES. 



367 



record the experiences of forty years. During these years the 

 raising of seedlings has never ceased, and it is a proof of the 

 unwillingness of nature to deviate from its fixed rules, that the 

 few varieties which I have been able to record, result ^from the 

 work of many years, and have been selected, I may say, from 

 thousands of seedlings, most of which have not materially 

 departed from the ordinary varieties which have been known for 

 centuries. 



Thus you will see that, as it ought to be, a very con- 

 siderable improvement has taken place in the production of 

 Peaches and Nectarines in the months of July and August. 

 Owing to the introduction of the orchard-house system, that 

 is of assembling a large number of sorts of Peaches and 

 Nectarines under one roof, it became possible to make experi- 

 ments in the way of raising seedlings by crossing the early 

 and small varieties with those of larger size and better flavour ; 

 and, in conjunction with my father, I paid a great deal of atten- 

 tion to this matter, with the result of producing sorts of fair 

 quality and size in the same house with the Early Nutmeg and 

 Early Mignonne. These very early and worthless sorts ripened 

 in an unheated orchard-house on July 25th; but the seedlings, 

 with the same attention, the same climate, and the same con- 

 ditions, ripened, according to the notes made by my father in 

 1865 : the Early Beatrice July 5th, the Early Louise July 8th, 

 the Early Kivers July 13th, the Early Leopold July 11th. Jj In 

 1868 the American Peach, Hale's Early, came in. Of course, 

 seasons vary very much, and this year the July Peaches 

 are much later than usual, but they are still ripe in July ; and 

 we are still at the time when no Peaches ripened according 

 to the Horticultural Society's catalogue. The statement that 

 Peaches which ripened in July had been raised in an un- 

 heated house was received with much doubting and incredulity. 

 This was only to be expected ; but out of England some indus- 

 trial use was made of them. In an account of the Texan Peach 

 crop, published in the Garden of June 26th, 1875, the reporter 

 says : " The Texan Peach crop is said to be unusually fine this 

 year, but, owing to the backwardness of the spring, it is nearly a 

 fortnight later in ripening than usual. Kivers' Peaches succeed 

 extremely well in Texas, and now (June 6th) cultivators are pick- 

 ing most beautiful samples of Early Beatrice, Early Louise and 



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