208 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



when I read the circulars of some cider makers who state they 

 have cider made from Ribston Pippins, Newtown Pippins, and 

 other high-class dessert apples. There are plenty of good cider 

 varieties with the requisite tannin, grown in our cider-making 

 districts, without having recourse to better sorts ; but this is 

 no reason why the suitable small fruit, not good enough for 

 market, cannot be profitably used. I am not about to give 

 you a treatise on cider making, but I may just mention that 

 large fine fruit from young trees does not make as good cider 

 as smaller fruit from old trees, and the juice is usually of 

 lower specific gravity, the reason doubtless being that there is 

 more water in the juice of the larger fruit, caused by the 

 greater activity of the roots of the younger trees. If you cannot 

 utilise your thirds for any of these purposes do not hesitate to 

 throw it away rather than mix it with the better class ; that is, 

 if you have no pigs or other stock you can give it to. It will pay 

 you better to do this. 



I may here mention that I sold last season (1895 and 1896) 

 upwards of 150 tons of dessert and cooking apples and pears, and 

 made into cider a good many hundreds of tons of cider apples 

 and perry pears, mostly of the best cider and perry sorts ; and 

 all this fruit was graded for different purposes. For the last few 

 years I have consigned all my best fruit under my own parti- 

 cular brand, and it was only a month ago I wrote to the fruit 

 salesman who sells most of my best in Oovent Garden Market, 

 asking him if he thought that it paid me to grade my apples. 

 His reply was as follows : "I am sure it has paid you to grade 

 the apples ; your Pomona brand has only to be shown and the 

 best buyers are all after it. They know well enough the packing 

 after I have received one or two lots." 



Packing. 



Pears should be graded the same as apples, but few of the 

 dessert pears make good perry. Some of our hardy perry sorts, 

 however, are amongst the best for stewing ; one of our oldest 

 perry pears, the Longland, equals the well-known Catillac for 

 stewing, with the advantage that it can be stewed whole. 



! [living dwelt rather long on the importance of grading and 

 the utilisation of the different grades, I will now turn to the next 



