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to ascribe it to tlie farina of one variety having come in contact 
vritli tiie flowers of another, at a moment wlien the stigmas were 
in a proper condition to receive it : and, on mentioning my 
opinion, [ was surprised to find, tliat the fact of such intermix- 
ture producing an immediate change in the fruit, was generally 
doubted, and by many persons ]ironounced to be impossible. 
This led me to inquire, whether the subject had ever before 
engaged the attention of horticulturists ; and not to go farther 
back than the beginning of the last century, (though both 
Theophrastus and Pliny seem to allude to it,) I found that 
the notion was entertained by Bradley, who, in his New Im- 
provements in Planting and Gardening, after giving directions 
for fertilizing the female flowers of the hazel with the pollen of the 
male, says, — “ By this knowledge Ave may alter the property and 
taste of any fruit, by impregnating the one with the farina of 
another of the same class ; as, for example, a Codlin with a 
Pearmain, which will occasion the Codlin, so impregnated, to 
last a longer time than usual, and be of a sharper taste : or if 
the winter fruit should be fecundated with the dust of the sum- 
mer kinds, they will decay before their usual time : and it is 
from this accidental coupling of the farina of one kind with the 
other, that, in an orchard where there is variety of apples, even 
the fruit gathered from the same tree differs in its flavour and 
times of ripening; and moreover, the seeds of those apples so 
generated, being changed by that means from their natural 
qualities, will produce different kinds of fruit, if they are sown.” 
In the Philosophical Transactions, also, for the yeai\ 1745, 
the subject is noticed by Mr. Benjamin Cook, in a paper, con- 
cerning the effect which the farina of the blossoms of different 
sorts of apple-trees had on the fruit of a neighbouring tree. In 
this communication it is stated, that Mr. Cook “sent to Mr. 
Peter Collinson, some Russetings, changed by the farina of a 
next neighbour, whose name he wanted skill to know; but could 
only say, that the Russeting had acquired its face and com- 
plexion. Mr. Collinson then produced several samples of the 
apples : an untainted Russeting ; a Russeting changed in 
complexion, which grew among a great cluster of unaltered 
brethren ; and some apples of the other tree which had caused 
the change in the Russetings, and whose fruit, had in return, 
received a rough coat from the Russetings.” A farther proof 
