THE PEACH. 
589 
very much the same place in the ancient Chinese writings, thal 
the tree of knowledge of the old Scriptures, and the golden 
Ilesperides apples of the heathens, do in the early history of the 
western nations. The traditions of a peach tree, the fruit of 
which when eaten conferred immortality, and which bore only 
once in a thousand years — and of another peach tree of know- 
ledge, which existed in the most remote period on a mountain 
guarded by a hundred demons, the fruit of which produced 
death — are said to be distinctly preserved in some of the early 
Chinese writings. Whatever may have been the nature of these 
extraordinary trees, it is certain that, as Lord Bacon says, “not 
a slip or sucker has been left behind.” We must therefore con- 
tent ourselves with the delight which a fine peach of modern 
times affords to the palate and the eye. 
We believe there is at the present time no country in the 
world where the peach is grown in such great quantities as in 
the United States.* North of a line drawn from the Mohawk 
river to Boston, comprising most of the Eastern States, they do 
not indeed flourish well, requiring some artificial aid to produce 
regular crops; but in all the Middle, Southern, and Western 
States, they grow and produce the heaviest crops in every garden 
and orchard. Thousands of acres in New Jersey, Delaware and 
Maryland, are devoted to this crop for the supply of the markets 
of New York and Philadelphia ; and we have seen, in seasons of 
great abundance, whole sloop loads of fruit of second quality, or 
slightly decayed, thrown into the North river in a single morn- 
ing. The market price usually varies from fifty cents To four 
dollars per bushel, according to the abundance of the crop, and 
to the earliness or lateness of the season at which they are 
offered ; one hundred and fifty cents being considered a good 
retail price. Many growers in New Jersey have orchards of 
from 10,000 to 20,000 trees of different ages, and send to market 
in good seasons as many bushels of fruit fi’om the bearing trees. 
When the crop is not universally abundant, the profits are very 
large ; if the contrary, they are often very little. But, as in some 
districts, especially in New Jersey, peaches are frequently grown 
on land too light to produce good crops of many other kinds, the 
investment is a good one in almost all cases. Undoubtedly, 
however, the great peach -growing district of the United States 
will one day be the valleys of the Ohio and Mississippi. With 
an equally favourable climate, that portion of the country pos- 
sesses a much finer soil, and the flavour of its peaches is unusual- 
ly rich and delicious. 
The very great facility with which the peach grows in this 
* It will amuse our readers to read in McIntosh’s work, “ The Orchard,” 
that “ the Americans usually eat the clingstones, while they reserve the 
freestones for feeding the pigs 1 ” 
