24 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
in filling the gaps between the ordinary varieties and earliest plums. 
Seed planted in August will come up at once, and the plants should 
be wintered in a cool house or frame and planted out in mid- April. 
They will fruit abundantly in July and August. The discovery of 
the better-flavoured Gooseberries is proceeding apace, and for the 
children home for the summer holidays they are most opportune. 
Here, too, the season may be extended by planting some of the late- 
ripening varieties, such as 'Sandwich Yellow/ 'Lancer,' 'Telegraph,' 
&c. If there still exists anyone to whom the Gooseberry remains a 
plebeian fruit, to be honoured once at Whitsuntide and then forgotten, 
they should try ' Cheshire Lass,' ' Langley Gage,' ' Rosebery,' ' Glenton 
Green, ' and repent at leisure. Too little care is given to gathering fruit, 
and especially does this apply to the earlier varieties. Both Apples and 
Pears of early varieties require to be gathered when they are still 
firmly attached to the tree. ' Williams ' and ' Jargonelle ' pears, for 
instance, should be gathered when they present a green and formidable 
appearance. The golden rule is : Gather early fruit early, and leave 
the late ones on the trees as long as possible. Mid-season varieties 
require a midway method. Furthermore, early fruits should not 
all be gathered at once or they all ripen together. If three or four 
gatherings are made, even if only at a few days' interval, they will 
ripen successively. One often hears : "All my pears go soft at the 
core." This is their protest against a late gathering. A few ex- 
periments will soon show how remarkable a difference this successional 
gathering will make. Thinning fruit is also too little practised, 
resulting in a prolific crop of marbles one year and nothing the next. 
It might almost be said that no one as yet has ever thinned too heavily. 
A slight exercise of the imagination will show that one full-sized 
fruit left on each spur will be quite sufficient in the case of Apples 
and Pears. Trees which bear only in alternate years can often be 
brought back to an annual crop by careful thinning. It is frequently 
said : "We cannot grow fruit, as we have no place to store it." The 
reply to this is : "It is not necessary." I know no better way of 
storing Apples and Pears than to wrap them in paper, put in a box and 
shut the lid. The box is then placed in a cupboard or shed, marking 
outside the name of the variety and season it should be ripe. ' Cox's 
Orange Pippin ' may thus be kept in perfect condition till March if 
well ripened. A frost-proof building is not necessary. They may 
be frozen as hard as stones, as mine were this year, but if allowed to 
thaw slowly, and I fancy in the dark, they will come out uninjured. 
Anyone who can provide a box, and a place to store it, should be able 
to keep late Apples and Pears, without the slightest difficulty. I have 
tried covering Apples in boxes with sand, sawdust, &c, and all are 
good from the point of preservation, but they all leave some slight 
flavour. If an odourless medium could be found, this would be an 
ideal method for the small grower. A frequent cause of fruit keeping 
badly is the fact that it is not properly ripened. It may be said that 
every fruit must receive the kiss of the sun once a day. The soft, 
green fruits growing in the shade are useless, and the pruner should 
