3io 



GARDENERS' MAGAZINE. 



May H, 1*98. 



Fruit Blossom. 



The plum trees on the south and east walls have been a foam of white 

 flowers, and when their glory waned the pear trees opened out great 

 clusters of snowy blossoms, and the smaller, paler blooms of the cherry 

 appeared. Last to come, but loveliest of all when it does arrive, is the apple 

 blossom. The grey -brown of its gnarled stems and branches, the vivid green 

 of its leaves, and the pink and white of the bloom, make an apple tree in 

 flower one of the most beautiful colour schemes to be found in Nature. 



It is doubtful whether any order of plants can show, with such a 

 similarity of flower, such a diversity of fruit as can the order of Rosacea. 

 For besides such well-known and conspicuous examples as tfie rose, 

 hawthorn, sloe, plum, cherry, almond, peach, apricot, apple, pear, medlar, 

 quince, strawberry, raspberry, and bramble, there are the more insignifi- 

 cant but not less interesting fruits of the burnets, spiraeas, geums, and 

 potentillas. The flowers of all these, though differing greatly in size ai.d 



of the little yellow-flowered potentilla. This is of th* Q ; mn u * * 

 sisting of a number of seedlike bod.es, ^S&^S^V^ 

 each containing its seed fast closed in a dry covering Th*L u 5 ' 

 grow on a dry flattened disc The fruits 0/ the geums aT * TjltT 

 they possess appendages which assist in their dissemination The < ' ' 

 berry is a plant of the same habit as the potertilla and'hasTvL 

 kind of fruit, but the disc instead of being flat and dry h 



Kino 01 iruu, uuc ».c ^ .^icaa 01 oemg flat and dry has become We 

 succulent, and fleshy, exquisite in colour, delicious in flavour, and £' 

 the seed-like fruits embedded on its surface. No order presents Z 

 interesting evidences of the process of an evolution extending over man 

 ages than does the rose order. The prototype of our highly develop 

 and highly civilised orchard trees is the little creeping potentilla men 

 tioned above— a humble little plant with yellow flowers and much divided 

 simple leaves, primitive in habit as its colouring, if yellow be as manv 

 hold it is, the primitive floral colour. Out of this, in course' o( time 

 evolved a plant known as the barren wild strawberry, placed by some 



e 



D 



C 



B 



- * - 



t> 



A 



6I8B 



Diagram of Plum Blossom. 



C 



8188 



Diagram of Bramble Blossom. 



A, calyx ; B, corolla ; C, stamen ; D, pistil ; E, disc 



8183 



Diagram of Rose Blossom. 



colour, are very similar in general structure as far as the two most obvious 

 organs, the corolla and stamens, are concerned. Their variations lie in 

 the number of the pistils, and the curious relationships that exist between 

 the pistil and the calyx, and it is to these that the differences of the fruits 



are to be ascribed. 



The accompanying diagrams show four of the more important of these 

 variations. No. i. is of the plum blossom. The calyx is in the form of a 

 deep cup, in the middle of the base of which grows a solitary pistil. 

 This, after fertilisation, develops into a plum, the calyx, corolla, and 

 stamens dying away, and leaving only the fruit on the flower-stalk. The 

 almond, peach, cherry, and nectarine are all formed in a similar way, and 

 are all, technically speaking, drupes ; that is to say, fruits consisting of 

 an outer succulent portion enclosing an inner, stony portion which con- 

 tains the seed. No. 2 is of the raspberry blossom. The base of the 

 calyx is filled with tissue which rises into the centre of the flower as a 

 conical disc, and bears the pistils. These develop into little juicy 

 drupelets, exactly similar in structure to the drupes, though so much 

 smaller. It follows, then, that a raspberry, bramble, or dewberry is not a 

 single fruit, but a collection of fruits. No. 3 is of the rose blossom. The 

 calyx is tubular in form, and attached to its inner base and sides are 



authorities among the potentillas, by others among the fragarias or 

 strawberries. The much-divided simple leaves were transformed to 

 compound leaves with the leaflets, the yellow flowers became white, and 

 the plant grew in tufts instead of in straggling runners. After another 

 lapse of time, out of this came the strawberry, Fragaria vesca, a more 

 erect plant with the same threefold leaves, but with larger, whiter flower> 

 and the edible fruit that has been described. The birds liked the fruit, 

 ate it, and thus dispersed the seeds more effectively than the wind or a 

 chance agent, and the type became fixed and far-spread. 



Next in order would come the spiraeas and geums, taller herbs, with 

 dry, insignificant-looking fruits, and after them the raspberry and bramble, 

 larger and more imposing plants, with edible fruits, and long woody 

 stems, which, however, could not hold themselves erect, with fruits so 

 liked by the birds that the dispersion of the seeds and the survival ot trie 

 type was assured. The primitive rose not only produced an infinite 

 variety of its own kind, which have been further multiplied, developeci, 

 and differentiated by culture, but it gave rise to three types distinct troni 

 it and from each other— the hawthorn, plum, and apple. In these 

 arrive at woodland trees which stand erect. The only obvious connecting 

 link between the hawthorn and plum families is the fruit. The hawtnom 



C 



D 



A 



818* 



Fruit of Potentilla tormentilla 



81 & 8 



Diagram of Apple Blossom. 



Fruit of Wood Avens {Geum urbanum). 



Fruit of 



Mountain Avens (Dryas ocio^la). 



many little flask-shaped pistils, the heads of which make the yellow-green 

 centre of the flower. As the fertilised pistil ripens into the small, hard, 

 stony fruit, the calyx-tube ripens with it, entirely enclosing the true fruit, 

 and forming the scarlet hip which makes our hedgerows bright in autumn 

 and which children not inaptly call « Soldiers' Buttons." No. 4 is of the 

 apple blossom. The calyx is, again, cup-shaped, and inside, growing 

 from its base, are two, three, four, or five pistils. After these have been 

 ertilised, an extraordinary change takes place in the flower. The whole of 

 the calyx-tube swells up and develops into a mass of soft edible tissue, which 

 constitutes a false fruit, and encloses the true fruit as the core. Such fruits 

 are called pomes, other kinds of which are the pear, medlar, and quince. 



The fruit cf the strawberry is best understood bv first examining that 



- From it the 



yields little crimson haws, which are rudimentary dru P e *\ . kn0tt - n as 

 blackthorn, with its larger, more pulpy but astringent *™*> u j c j e r 

 sloes, leads to the common wild plum tree, which bears ^^ Ry 



fruit, but one still scarcely suited in flavour to a armsc y ^ pf0 . 

 cultivation and selection all the varieties of garden plums . . ffl 



duced from the sloe and wild plum. The cherry is an ss ue ^ . 

 the bird-cherry, with its currant-like bunches of little 0 w ; t h a 



frenPral in n«wl, ~f TT-„1„«^ . onrl the COHimOIl Wild "WW';,, ^ 



l of England ; and the common* io the 



embling the black garden chenjj «ju ^ 

 r * ka.. the lanre hardy trees 01 ine h 



general in the north 



fruit smaller but resemuung ine um<-~ & — , w „ 

 southern counties. Lastly we have the large hardy tre " t i e £ngl 

 pear, the former of which may be almost regarded as ou Gr £ VES0I i. 

 fruit 



