Fruit-growing in Kent. 
103 
them in pots under glass, I have heen able to preserve them from 
■any other fecundations, but the plants have not yet borne fruit." 
There has been a fallacy prevalent, that trees raised from grafts 
do not survive the parent stock — that when an apple-tree dies 
all those trees that have been propagated from scions taken from 
it die in mournful accord. Mr. Knight, who was President of 
the Horticultural Society in the latter part of the last century, 
firmly believed in this curiously unnatural provision, and attri- 
buted the decay of the best sorts to its action. " The Golden 
Pippin," he wrote, "is in the last stage of decay, and the Styre 
and the Fox-whelp are hastening rapidly after them. I think 
1 mi justified in the conclusion that all apple-plants propagated 
from the same stock partake in some degree of the same life, and 
will attend it in the habits of their growth, their maturity and 
decay, though they will not be affected by any incidental injuries 
the parent trees may sustain after they are detached from it."* 
The naivete of this illogical statement is amusing. If an 
apple-tree die peacefully in its bed, having come to a green old 
age, its offshoots forthwith one and all decay. If, however, a 
tree is blown or cut down, the offshoots are not expected to 
commit suicide. Many generations of original trees have died 
and their descendants flourish yet. The Golden Pippin still 
exists in Kent, and the Styre and Fox-whelp are still plenti- 
ful in Herefordshire, in spite of Mr. Knight's funeral sermon 
in 1797. 
Notwithstanding this reductio ad absurdum, there can be no 
doubt that apple-trees produced from cross-fertilised seed would 
be more vigorous and fruitful than those reared in the usual 
way, from a long series of stocks propagated by scions. This 
process is certainly unnatural, though it is convenient, in conse- 
quence of the tendency to atavism inherent in most plants that 
have been improved by selection. Artificial fecundation is a 
delicate operation, requiring careful manipulation and nicety of 
management, which prevent its general adoption. It is true it 
is practised in a rough way by the peasant girls of St. Valery, 
who go forth armed with apple-blossoms to faire ses pommes, 
to fecundate a peculiar sort of apple-tree whose flowers are 
devoid of stamens ; but this is done to secure fruitfulness without 
reference to propagation. Mr. Darwin shows most clearly in 
his recent interesting workj that cross fertilisation of plants 
improves them in most important points, and that continuous 
self-fertilisation through many generations tends to gradual 
* ' A Treatise on the Culture of the Apple and Pear.' By T. A. Knight, Esq. 
1797. 
t 'The Effects of Cross and Self-FertilUation in the Vegetable Kingdom.' 
Darwin. 1876. ' 
