576 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ December 80, 1S£6. 
of the ripening period of Pears, for he says, “ I have known 
the fruit of a Pear tree in one year all ripe and gone by the 
middle of October, and the very next year the fruit has not been 
fi r . to eat until the very middle of December.” All of us can 
endorse Miller’s remarks. I have found it a very difficult matter 
to fix the date of ripening, and the variations noticed in 1759 
find their equiva’ent in 1886. In reference to this matter, 
Miller says that “if we look back to the best French authors 
of fifty years ago, they put down the times of ripening of Pears 
a month or six weeks later than now, and that in London it is 
much about the same, the time of ripen ng in London being 
quite as forward as Paris.” This remark does not seem to indicate 
that the climate is becoming colder, as many are inclined to 
think. There are many writers on pomology after Philip Miller, 
but as far as the names of Pears are concerned we may step from 
1759 to 1831, when a book was published by George Lindley and 
edited by Dr. Lindley, entitled “ A Guide to the Orchard and 
Kitchen Garden.’’ The list of Pears is here brought down 
nearly to our own time 150 dessert Pears being enumerated, 
among them many of our old friends of 1665, 1693, 1729, 1731, 
and 1789, and adding to the list a number of new sorts raised 
from seed by Yan Mons, Nelis, and others. According to 
Lindley many of these are not worth much, the Duchesse 
d’Angouleme and Beurre Diel being credited with special praise, 
the Marie Louise, however, not being very highly commended. 
In 1842 the Royal Horticultural Society published a list of 442 
sorts, and Dr. Hogg, iu the fifth edition of the “Fruit Manual,” 
1884, describes 732 sorts. Andre Leroy, in the “Dictionary of 
Pomology” has 915 sorts, and the cry is, “Still they come.” 
The new sorts that have been constantly introduced showing that 
the highest standard of excellence has not yet been reached, and 
that no fruit is so susceptible of high development as the Pear, 
as it advances step by step with the higher cultivation of man ; 
this advance being by no means rapid, as it has taken many 
centuries to produce a Pear of the quality of the Doyenne du 
Comice, this fruit being far superior to any of those noticed by 
Lindley in 1831. 
It is curious that Shakespere, country bred, should never have 
mentioned Pears by name, save once, in “ Romeo and Juliet,” when 
lie alludes to the Popperin Pear, now known in Worcestershire 
as the Poplir Pear, still one of the common perry Pears of the 
county. It is evident from this meagre notice of Pears that 
Shakespere’s tastes were not gratified by good fruit. In “The 
Merry Wives of Windsor” he uses the phrase, “ crestfallen like 
a dried Pear.” The plump and juicy Pears of our century when 
fallen rot before they wither, but the tough perry Pears wither 
before they rot Worcestershire abounds with Pear orchards, and 
bhakespere, had he seen these orchards in full bloom, would 
surely have expressed his admiration. There is no allusion in 
any of his plays, poems, or sonnets to the beautiful spectacle of 
a Pear tree sheeted with its snow-white blossoms. Another 
country poet, Robert Herrick, although enthusiastic in praise of 
Strawberries and Cherries, never alludes to Pears. Herrick 
spent the best years of his life in Devonshire, which must have 
been almost destitute of Pear trees. Sir John Suckling celebrates 
the charms of a young lady in his lines— 
“ Her cheeks ai'e l ; ke the Katherine Pear, 
The side that’s next the sun.” 
Batty Langley notices two Katharine Pears, the Royal and the 
Queen. 
Standard Pears are utterly unsuited for small gardens, and 
should be grown in orchards only. Those who are blessed with 
old and decrepit standard trees may renew their vigorous growth 
by heading them down. In three years young, healthy, and fruit¬ 
ful branches will replace the old and useless wood of genera¬ 
tions. A difference is sometimes observed in the conduct of trees 
on the Pear stock. Some will be more fruitful and bear larger 
fruit than other trees of the same sort and age. This arises from 
the influence of the stock upon the graft. All Pear stocks are 
raised from seed, and great variety of course exists. The 
difference sometimes seen in the produce of trees growing side 
by side is often so great as to cause doubts of the identity of the 
fruit. 
The seedling Pear stocks imported from France are raised 
from the pips of perry Pears, and of these two soits are distin¬ 
guished, one with smooth bright leaves from the district of Le 
Mans, and the other, woolly or sage-leaved, from the province of 
Anjou. 1 believe the pips of the wild or forest Pear are employed 
in Germany for raising stocks. 
Garden trees on the Pear stock should be either trained 
as espaliers, wall trees, or pyramids Root pruning wil 
cause unfruitful trees to bear, and those who have them 
will do well to practise it. The Pear stock is not fastidious 
about soil. My own experience of the Quince stock con¬ 
vinces me that it is the most useful stock for all styles of 
garden training, it is adapted for espaliers, pyramids, bushes and 
cordons. Cordon training, althoagh known and practised in 
England for some time, has been brought mors prominently into 
fashion during the last thirty years. It is perhaps the most 
simple and productive of all sorts of training. An oak fence 
7 feet high, planted with diagonal trees 18 inches apart, in four 
years will produce a large quantity of fruit, and a wall from 
12 to 15 feet high in five to six years will produce like results. 1 
have found that pruning twice a year (in Jum and October) is 
sufficient to keep the trees in fruitful order. In the June pruning 
the young shoots^mustbe stopped at the fifth or sixth leaf, and in 
October every spur must be pruned as close to the main stem as 
possible, avoiding any injury to the fruit buds, which are of 
course easily detected, diagonal cordons may also be trained to wire 
trellises, and treated in the same fashion ; this is a very interest¬ 
ing and ornamental style. The single horizontal cordons aud 
the double horizontal cordons, trained at 18 inches from the 
ground, form a neat and fruitful edging to side walks. The 
five-branched vertical cordon has five upright shoots springing 
from a common horizontal base. These may be planted 4 feet 
apart. The horizontal cordon has the branches trained at 
regular intervals from a main vertical stem, this form is ad¬ 
mirably adapted for espaliers by garden walks, and is very trac¬ 
table and pleasant to manage. Vertical cordons planted in the 
open ground 4 feet apart will give large crops of fruit. Two 
forms of cordon training seem to me to be very unpractical— i.e., 
vase co'don and the plan of training over an arched trellis, the 
former is more trouble to manage than a bush tree and gives no 
better results, and the latter is contrary to common sense, part 
of the tree being grown in the shade. All cordons require the 
same system of pruning. Pyramid and bush trees on the Quince 
stock are charming garden trees, the pruning is somewhat 
different to that practised for cordon trees, the side shoots 
should be pruned in June and the leading shoot untouched until 
October, superfluous shoots being occasionally removed during 
the summer to admit the 3un, the unpruned leading shoot must 
be shortened baek in October. 
Garden trees require root management, and a modified 
system of root-pruning should be practised with all. A circular 
trench about 3 feet from the stem of the tree should be dug annually 
if the room for the tree is restricted, in the autumn the soil in this 
trench should be refreshed with manure and fresh soil, and a sur¬ 
face dressing of artificial manure applied during the spring. For 
the latter purpose soot, superphosphate of lime, and guano are 
probably the most useful. The trench and the manure will 
render the planter independent of the soil. If Pear-growing is 
to be made a certainty, cultivation under glass must be adopted. 
A glass house is of course a prime necessity, it may be as plain 
as possible for the purposes of protection. During the spring 
the trees can be packed closely, for in the early period of growth 
they do not require much space ; about the end of May, or when 
all danger of frost is past, many of the trees should be put out of 
doors, leaving enough in the house to stand 3 feet from each 
other. The trees taken out of the house should be plunged in a 
border prepared for them, and the trees inside sunk in the soil 
up to the rim of the pot, the sides of the pot should be per¬ 
forated, but this is not an absolute necessity. The trees should 
be surface-dressed with manure, and watered with manure water 
twice or three times a week, when under glass abundance of air 
must be given. Culture under glass makes a crop a certainty, 
and requires no more attention than is given to Melon or 
Cucumber growing. 
Protection to cordon trees trained about 1 foot from the 
ground may be given by planks on each side placed on edge 
supported by short stakes and covered with mats during severe 
frost. Ground vineries also form very efficient protection, but 
they are not so cheap as the planks. 
Raising seedling Pears is always interesting from the un¬ 
certainty which attends the pursuit. I have raised some 
hundreds from the best sorts known, which I have crossed in 
every conceivable fashion. The “ Conference ’ Pear, which 
gained the suffrages of the Committee of the Pear Congress of 
1885, came from a baking Pear, the Leon le Clerc de Lava , the 
pips of which I planted without any special design All pips 
intended for seed should Le taken from the finest and best de¬ 
veloped fruit. 
The sorts of Pears of recent introduction selected by the Pear 
Congress of 1885 were the following :— 
