December 1,1881. ] JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 489 
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Lmnaean Society, at 8 f.m. 
2nd Sunday in Advent. 
Sale of Bulbs at Mr. Stevens’s Rooms, Covent Garden. 
APPLES AND PEARS OF THE LATE SEASON. 
■'*’ 'TJTj^T is now time to speak of the year 1881 as it has 
proved to be. The promise of spring is over ; 
the fulfilment of autumn is also over. My 
knowledge and observations must be under¬ 
stood to be confined to the four counties— 
Wilts, Somerset, Hampshire, and Sussex ; 
further afield I have not been. What, then, of 
the past season ? We have had lately pleasant 
scraps ” concerning fruit, but happily the fruits have 
not themselves been “scraps” or small samples, but, as 
far as I have seen, an abundant harvest. 
Let me first speak of Pears. The Pear which has this year 
pleased me above all others is Beurre Hardy, a Pear parti¬ 
cularly recommended to me a few years since by the late 
excellent senior Editor of this Journal. “ Whatever Pears 
you plant, mind and plant a Beurre Hardy, that grand large 
Pear,” said Mr. Johnson, and my experience of it fully con¬ 
firms his opinion. It is large, handsome in outline and colour, 
looks well on the tree and on the dessert dish, and, more than 
all, has ripened well ; is perfect, to my mind, in its Pine-Apple¬ 
like flavour, and so juicy we seem to be eating and drinking 
at once. It forms also a very handsome tree both as to growth 
and leaf, and is fit for a lawn. Next and worst is Beurre Diel; 
so bad that I have uprooted the tree. Mr. Smee says of it, 
“Very unequal, sometimes very good.” It may be the latter, 
but it has proved only bad with me, though I have tried it 
year after year. Another very inferior Pear is Seckle, which 
I do not think worth growing. It is very small and of a 
vulgar sweet taste, fit only for a huckster’s shop and for school 
children to spend their pennies on. 
Concerning Beurre d’Amanlis I must speak a favourable 
word. It has proved with me an enormous cropper of clean- 
grown large fruit, handsome in form. One I have (a pyramid) 
resembled a fountain as each branch bent with its load, and it 
well deserved being photographed. It is not certainly the 
high-class Pear that Beurre Hardy is, but it comes in well 
after Jargonelle. Mr. Smee speaks of it thus disparagingly : 
“ Beurre d’Amanlis is a handsome large Pear, utterly devoid of 
flavour.” Now, good judge of fruit as was the late Mr. Smee, 
I must differ from him here. This Pear is utterly devoid of 
flavour until’it is perfectly ripe—regularly dead ripe, then it is 
good, but before then it is a mere Turnip. The best early Pear 
I still hold,to be with Rivers the Summer Doyenne, and Ber- 
gamotte Esperen is one of the best winter and spring Pears. 
Other Pears do not call for much comment. One remark I 
would make—that I gather winter Pears as late as possible, 
each year later than before, for I am sure it is the best plan, 
and that until the leaves turn colour the fruit should be on the 
tree ; this I take to be the right rule. 
I now turn to Apples. Let no one shudder, but with further 
experience I should never again think of planting Joanetting, 
Margaret, Keswick CodliD, and—start not, lover of old days— 
not Golden Pippin either. Joanetting and Margaret are quite 
surpassed by Irish Peach in healthiness of tree, beauty and 
flavour of fruit, and length of keeping. So also Keswick 
Codlin is equally surpassed by Lord Suffield. For winter 
dessert Cox’s Orange Pippin eclipses the old Golden and also 
Ribston Pippin, because it does not canker, and the Ribston does. 
I am satisfied with Duchess of Oldenburg ; more and more 
pleased with Ecklinville Seedling, an Apple among the best 
twenty grown. I am also equally satisfied with Winter Haw- 
thornden, better so called than New Hawthornden, as the term 
“ winter ” keeps it distinct from the other and older, which is a 
summer fruit, and very excellent it is, but the tree is given to 
canker, whereas the Winter Hawthornden is remarkably healthy. 
Beauty of Kent also cankers terribly when grown on the Para¬ 
dise stock, which I regret, as it is a magnificent Apple. Lod- 
dington I think well of, but my experience of it is short, so 
also of Betty Geeson. As of Ecklinville Seedling, so I desire 
to have a special word of commendation for Gravenstein and 
Stirling Castle. The former is of good size, singular shape, 
and true to the origin of its name, “ Engraved Stone.” I do 
not know a better Apple for the two purposes, table and cook¬ 
ing, and its size recommends it, together with its keeping well. 
Stirling Castle is another admirable Apple, of gcod size and 
beautiful shape ; but the tree is apt to bear so much as to 
make little growth. The fruit will keep well over Christmas, 
and the flavour is excellent. There is a misprint in the “ Fruit 
Manual ” in regard to this Apple, where it is put down as 
“ in use early in August,” while it is not ready until October. 
Did it grow as strongly it would compete for the premiership 
with Dumelow’s Seedling as a winter cooking Apple ; but 
taken altogether the old seedling is unequalled. Peasgood’s 
Nonsuch does not bear with me, also in a certain degree 
Summer Golden Pippin and Striped Beefin. 
Next a wmrd about cankering. I think, first of all, there is 
in some varieties a strong tendency to canker, while others are 
perfectly healthy. I have moved into exactly the same place 
a Dumelow’s Seedling where another tree has died of canker ; 
but it remains perfectly healthy, so that soil does not affect 
canker much, but frost increases it, particularly with new wood ; 
also a damp situation—ground that needs draining—increases 
the disease in those trees given to cankering, as also “ gum¬ 
ming ” in Plum trees ; but still I hold that the tendency to 
canker badly is innate in some varieties, such as Old Hawthorn¬ 
den, better called Summer Hawthornden, Beauty of Kent on 
the Paradise stock, Ribston Pippin, and some others. 
I should gladly see many varieties of Apples and Pears dis¬ 
appear from nurserymen’s fruit lists, and then they would 
gradually go out of cultivation. I doubt whether there are 
more than forty first-class Apples—first-class in flavour, size, 
bearing, and healthiness, putting aside the cider varieties. I 
also should be satisfied with forty Pears for walls, forty for 
pyramids, and forty for standards, but I doubt if such forties 
fully satisfying all requirements are to be found. If we are to 
become a fruit-growing nation for profit we must have for the 
market Apples equal to those sent from America, and Pears 
really good, not deceivers lying on fruit dishes for show omy 
No. 75.—You III, Third series. 
No. 1731.-You LXVI., Old Series. 
