The Garden Magazine, June, 1920 
261 
which, like the preceding, all belong to the great Rose family. At the head 
of these stands the Peach — Prunus persica — unquestionably introduced to 
this country in the voyages undertaken for exploration and commerce soon 
after the discovery of America by Columbus. We are sure of this because 
soon after permanent settlement had been made in the South, the settlers 
found that this fruit was in widespread cultivation by the Indians, and as 
early as 1682 William Penn wrote, “ there are very good peaches in Pennsyl- 
vania, not an Indian plantation is without them." 
During the reign of the Emperor Claudius the Romans received the Peach 
from Persia, and for centuries it was considered native of that country, hence it 
received a specific name to that effect. Present-day authorities, however, are 
pretty well agreed that its real home is China, though undisputably wild trees 
have never been discovered anywhere! Nevertheless, it is found naturalized 
over the greater part of China, where it has been cultivated for its fruit as 
far back as records go. And per- 
sonally, 1 think there can be no 
doubt about its having its origin 
there. 1 am convinced that it 
reached Persia and the Caspian 
region through seeds carried by 
the old trade route across central 
Asia. The smooth-skinned Peach 
— otherwise theNectarine — isalso 
of Chinese origin, and seems to 
prefer a rather warm climate. 
It is much grown in northern 
Formosa. 
From China the Peach 
was 
Of peculiar interest to us to-day is 
the Plum, since our native species 
offer richer promise than any- 
thing else of carrying forward 
the story of fruit development 
More widely distributed than any 
other fruit is the Peach and most gen- 
erally prized, though it is not certainly 
known wild anywhere in the world 
The delicious and pop- 
ular Bartlett Pear 
represents the ancient 
European type, varie- 
ties of which were very 
numerous even in the 
time of Pliny 
long ago taken to Korea and Japan, where to-day a great many 
local varieties are cultivated. To France and Britain it was 
introduced by the Romans, but it was not much cultivated in 
England before the 1 6th century. The Spanish as already men- 
tioned, introduced it to South America; it has been planted in 
the more temperate parts of Africa (the famous missionary- 
traveller, Fivingston, planted it by the Victoria Falls on the 
Zambesi River), it has made its way to Australasia and, indeed, 
no fruit tree is to-day more widely grown. 
The Apricot — Prunus armeniaca — is another fruit tree 
whose specific name is a geographical misnomer. Origin- 
ally considered native of the Caucasus and Armenia its Chinese 
origin is now pretty generally accepted. And its history is 
similar to that of the Peach. The Romans received and culti- 
vated it — it is described by Pliny and Dioscorides — and almost 
certainly carried it to France and England, though the first 
mention of its being in England is inTurner’s“Herbal, ’’published 
in 1562. In China 1 personally know it only as a cultivated 
tree, but many travellers have seen it wild in the northern pro- 
vinces. It is much grown in Korea and though I have not yet 
had time to compare 
critically the mater- 
ial, 1 am inclined to 
think that an Apri- 
cot I gathered on 
cliffs in northern 
Korea, and unques- 
tionably wild there, 
represents this 
species. 
A common wild 
tree in central Korea 
is the Manchurian 
Apricot (P. mand- 
shurica) which grows 
to a very large size. 
Its fruit is similar to 
that of the common 
Apricot but the leaves 
differ and its bark is thick and corky, black outside and red 
beneath. Then there is the so-called Black Apricot (P. dasy- 
carpa) of uncertain origin but probably west Asian, introduced 
into England in 1800. This has white flowers, produced very 
early, and purplish-black fruit. 
In his “History of Plants,” written some 300 years before the 
Christian era, Theophrastus gives a good description of the 
Sweet Cherry; but in ancient Greece it was little esteemed as a 
fruit tree. Pliny states that Fucullus, the Roman soldier and 
epicure, brought them to Rome sixty-five years before the birth 
of Christ. But Pliny may have been in error since the illustrious 
Roman scholar, Marcus Terentius Varro, in his book on farming, 
written in 37 B. C. — only twenty-eight years later — treats of 
them as commonplace orchard trees of the period, and tells 
when and how to graft them. The Romans carried cultivated 
varieties to England and the tree became well established in 
Kent during their occupation of Britain. 
The Cherry trees that are cultivated in gardens and orchards 
of the West for their fruit, are the product of two species — 
Prunus avium and Prunus Cerasus — respectively the Sweet 
and Sour Cherries, both of Eurasian origin. They have been 
cultivated from very early times and their history is very similar 
to that of the Apple and the Pear. The Sweet Cherry, Mazzard 
or Gean, from which the Heart and Bigarreau cherries have been 
derived, is a native of western Europe (including England and 
Norway) and eastward to Asia Minor and the Caucasus, but 
is rare in a wild state in Spain and Italy; in Russia it is appar- 
