AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST, 
FOR THE 
ITarm, GrardLen, and. IdouseI t old. 
“ AGRICULTURE 18 THE MOST HEALTHFCL, MOST CSEFUL, ANI» MOST NOBLE EMPLOYMENT OF MAN.»-W 10H , saT os.l 
ORASfGE IUDD, A.M., 
EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR. 
Office, 41 Paris Row, (Times Buildings.) 
ESTABLISHED IN 1842. 
Published botli in English and German. 
f $1.00 PER ANNUM, IN ADVANCE, 
■j SINGLE NUMBER, 10 CENTS. 
( For Contents, Terms, etc., see page 320. 
VOLUME XXI—No. 10. NEW-YORK, OCTOBER, 1863. NEW SERIES-No. 189. 
Entered according to act of Congress in the year 1862, by 
OiiANGK Judd, in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of 
the United States for the Southern District of New-York. 
ffS?“ Other Journals are invited to copy desirable articles 
freely, if each article be credited to American Agriculturist. 
SS'-See the Last Page, this month. 
“ What though the fruit tree rival not the worth 
Of Aricanian products ? Yet her freight 
Is not contemned; yet her wide branching arms 
Best screen thy mansion from the fervent day 
Adverse to life ; the wintry hurricanes 
In vain employ.their roar; her trunk unmoved 
Breaks the strong onset, and controls their rage. 
Chiefly the Roxbury, whose large increase, 
Annual, in sumptuous banquets claims applause. 
Thrice acceptable beverage ! could but art 
Subdue the floating lee, Pomona’s self 
Would dread thy praise, and shun the dubious strife.” 
Philips. 
If the apple is the fruit for the million, the 
pear is the fruit for the amateur. If the one 
should be planted in large orchards, the other 
should find its home in the garden and fruit 
yard about the dwelling. There is a reason for 
the enthusiasm with which this fruit is regard¬ 
ed by all pomologists, aside from the profits 
which it yields to nurserymen and to those who 
grow it for market. Though something called 
pears were known to the ancients, the delicious 
dessert fruit, now known by that name, is a mod¬ 
ern ‘invention.’ We read of pears in Virgil and 
Pliny, and other old Roman writers. What the 
fruit was, is readily inferred from the confession 
of the latter author, “ all pears whatsoever are 
but a heavy meat, unless they are well boiled or 
baked.” It was not until the seventeenth cen¬ 
tury, that pears made much progress. What 
that progress is any one can decide, who tastes 
a crabbed perry and a Seckel, and compares the 
juices. If the one gripes his throat and compels 
wry faces, the other leaves behind an aromatic 
sweetness, suggestive of the food of the gods. A 
fruit so capable of improvement in size and 
quality, very naturally awakens the enthusi¬ 
asm of cultivators—orchardists and amateurs. 
It unquestionably requires more skill, at least 
in the older States, to grow good pears, than 
good apples. The latter will flourish with little 
care after being once established. The former, 
especially if dwarfed upon the quince, must 
have a good soil and skillful cultivation to make 
it reward the planter. It pays abundantly for 
generous feeding and skillful handling, and per¬ 
haps it is owing in part to this fact that it is the 
special pet of some of our distinguished pomolo¬ 
gists. It heralds the fame of the fruit grower, 
and a man becomes distinguished according to 
the number of varieties and the size of the spec¬ 
imens of this fruit which he exhibits at the fairs, 
as in the olden time he became famous accord¬ 
ing as he lifted up the ax against the thick trees 
of the wood. Tree-slaying has become infa¬ 
mous, and he that would shine in fairs in modern 
times, must not only know how to select, but 
how to plant and prune, and feed pear trees. 
The rareness of fine varieties of this fruit lias 
made it an object of special desire to the culti¬ 
vated aud refined. It is somewhat a badge of 
social distinction, like diamonds and rare wines. 
Not one family in a thousand in this land of 
plenty has ever had a dish of this fruit at its 
best estate served for dessert. Virgalieus and 
Seckels are even rarer than wine, though our 
nurseries have sent forth trees by the thousand 
and tens of thousands, for the last score of years. 
Every genteel family living permanently in the 
country, or residing there for the Summer, 
plants dwarf and standard pears of approved 
varieties. Madam covets the fruit dish loaded 
with Bartletts, or Flemish Beauties, as she would 
splendid silver for her table. The silver is much 
more common at dinner than fine pears. It is 
a social triumph when our dwarfs are a success, 
and the pets of the fruit yard furnish a supply 
of melting pears for Summer guests. 
Whatever the cause, the pear has a popularity 
beyoud any other of the larger fruits. Downing 
glories in it, in prose more eloquent than song, 
and the discussions of highest interest in the 
meetings of our Pomological Societies are upon 
this fruit. With failures more numerous than 
successes, in planting dwarfs, people keep plant¬ 
ing them, determining with resolute Anglo Saxon 
courage to educate themselves into success. 
In its natural state, the pear is more hardy and 
long lived than the apple, reaching in rare cases 
the age of four hundred years. Though an ex¬ 
otic in this country, it is probably as vigorous 
and healthful here as in its native clime. The 
Stuyvesant pear tree still fruitful after two 
hundred years of bearing, is a good witness 
of the hardiness and the long life of this fruit. 
The causes of failure, especially with the 
dwarfs, are easily pointed out. More of them 
are from improper planting and from neglect 
than from all other causes. They are often set 
out upon land too poor to nourish them. They 
live, hut make no new wood. They are thrown 
prematurely into bearing by transplanting, and 
the cultivator, pleased with the early fruitfulness, 
lets them bear all they will. The whole force 
of the tree is thrown into fruit, and after a few 
years it is exhausted and dies. Sometimes 
the tree is planted too high, the quince stock 
being three or four inches above ground, instead 
of beneath, as it should be. The borer attacks 
the quince, and if neglected, soon destroys it. 
We have frequently seen them planted in green 
sward, the grass taking all the strength of the 
soil, and the trees looking much like walking 
canes, years after planting. Sometimes they 
are not manured at all. The demand is for 
abundant compost manuring every fall. Again, 
they are trimmed up as high as one’s head, be¬ 
fore they are suffered to make limbs. With the 
comparatively weak roots of the quince, this 
gives the winds a great purchase upon the tops 
of the trees, and unless they are staked up they 
are soon broken off. The demand is for limbs 
near the ground, forming a pyramidal base, to 
rise not more than a foot a year until the struc¬ 
ture gets beyond the reach of the pruning kni fe, 
The well-trained dwarf is a creation of human 
skill, as much so as any work of the architect. 
If a man does not know how to build, or can 
not take the time to learn, let him eschew dwarfs 
as too small business for him. Standards are 
more easily reared and much longer lived. 
They pay quite as well for good soil and culti¬ 
vation. They are much longer in coming into 
bearing, some varieties requiring fifteen years 
of good cultivation before they will give forth 
their treasures. But when once they break 
into fruit, they make up for lost time, aud are a 
fountain of delight to the fruit grower, for the 
rest of his life, and a monument to his memory 
when he is dead. As the season of planting 
again returns, we throw out these few hints in 
regard to the favorite fruit of modern times. 
Notwithstanding the war and the duty of thirty 
per cent., pear trees will continue to be import 
ed and planted. Let the work be well done. 
The War and Female Farmers.— We are 
constantly hearing, especially from the West, of 
instances where farmers have patriotically ex¬ 
changed the plow for the musket, encouraged to 
do so by their wives who have cheerfully as¬ 
sumed the care and responsibility of conducting 
the labors of the fields during their absence. 
Such noble women deserve not only the good 
will of their neighbors, but their kindest atten¬ 
tion. Let them want in nothing of friendly ad¬ 
vice, and oversight against imposition in the sale 
of then produce, and in the purchase of supplies. 
See to it that they have the aid of a “ husking 
bee,” a wood-cutting gathering, and any other 
assistance that can be rendered to them. Farm¬ 
ers’ Clubs should take such cases under their 
special care. Our aged correspondent, Dioge¬ 
nes, has a talk about a woman farmer on anoth¬ 
er page of this month’s American Agriculturist. 
