380 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ October 25 , 1888. 
we pay our millions of money into other hands for produce which could 
come from ourselves we are quite safe in assuming that there is yet 
reason for action. 
Coming up from pastoral pursuits to this great centre of crowding, 
clamouring life, how can one express the feelings that somehow 
naturally force themselves to the front ? They may be said to be some¬ 
what thus : Here you have in your great crowded centre somewhere 
approaching 5,000,000 of souls. This area, with its vast population, has 
practically grown nothing but bricks and mortar save the trees and 
flowers in its beautiful pleasure parks and its promenades ; and if this 
great centre were dependent upon its own resources for market produce 
for its daily needs it would very quickly have to answer its children’s 
cry for bread by giving them stones. 
This great multitude must take some feeding. The open country 
of the shires gives garden ground enough for all. The earnings of the 
provinces find their way largely into the pockets of the landowners, and 
they, in the natural order of present day methods, spend a large portion 
of their time and the greater part of their wealth in London. There is 
a kind of feeling that, seeing so much of the wealth of the country 
comes here, more might be done for us and less for the foreign coquettes 
who court your favour and gain your sympathy and support for such 
things as we can grow quite satisfactorily at home. 
I do not at all fear the bogey of foreign competition. This is, I re¬ 
mind myself, a National Conference, but the subject is really universal. 
The idea involved in fruit production and distribution is too large for a 
nation. We cannot, for instance, grow the Orange. We should not like 
to dispense with it, therefore we invite the foreigner to send it to us ; 
but we can produce Pippins ; then why should you raise your eyes 
above the beautiful fertile plains, say, of Kent and Sussex, and with the 
telescope of a false economy find beyond the seas, in the broad acres of 
America, Canada, Australia, and elsewhere, the admitted beauty of 
fruitful plains, but also an added imaginary beauty, really nothing 
beyond what you could have seen without the glasses within the con¬ 
fining hedgerows of our British orchards ? 
We must, however, get somewhat nearer the chief points to be con¬ 
sidered. We must drop figure and get to facts. We think we may 
safely start with an aphorism. Cultivation of the land is the basis of 
all economy. Mother Earth, after all, nurtures the whole family of 
the human race. “ The profit of the earth is for all; the king himself 
is served by the field.” The political economist and the social scientist 
can touch no profounder problem than the problem of production, and 
we cannot escape the consideration of the threefold aspect of the laws 
of life which all rightly civilised people recognise :— 
1, The population must be properly employed. 
2, The people must be clothed and fed. 
3, As a necessary condition the land must be cultivated and 
cropped. 
Now we have already reminded ourselves that we have to take our¬ 
selves outside the limit line of streets and alleys and get into the open 
country, where we find agriculture and horticulture side by side, some¬ 
times overlapping each other, but always mainly concerned^with these 
four phases of occupation :—■ 
1, Cattle production, under which I would include the rearing and 
breeding of all animals for slaughter or other purposes. 
2, Wheat production, under which head I would include all arable 
farming. 
3, Dairy farming, under which I would include all milk, cheese, and 
dairy products. 
4, Fruit farming, including the production of vegetables and other 
market produce of this character. 
The consideration of the question of supply immediately brings 
before us the question of demand. AYe'ask ourselves, What is demand ? 
AV hy is it needful to produce ? An elementary question truly, but one 
which has been handled peculiarly by the jugglers of political and other 
economists. Briefly, produce is needed for the maintenance of political 
life. It was easy for the French wit to say , ct Give me the luxuries of 
life, let who will take its necessities ; ” but necessities are—necessities ! 
We then ask ourselves upon what can good health and happy life be 
best maintained. 
Well, I fear we should here quickly get into conflict of opinion. 
Doctors differ. 1 am justified, however, upon the grounds of science 
and of experience in asserting that men can live, and live healthfully 
and happily, on cereals and fruit, so that a AVheat farm and a fruit 
farm would meet all national needs. Cattle farming we are not now 
concerned about. 
I know I strike a chord which may not be one entirely of harmony 
in a meeting of this character, when I say that man can derive all 
needful sustenance from the cereals and fruit, that is to say, humanity 
has in fruits—for cereals are fruits—all that it needs. Mark, please, I 
do not say it has therein all that it crave3, but all that it needs. 
Now, if in any other machine than that of man (if you permit him 
to be so considered for a moment), heat, essential for its going, could 
be got from deal logs, and it was fed by the engineer with mahogany 
French polished, and refined oils, we consider it strange. Of course he 
might do it if he liked, but should we wonder why ? Man, so far as 
his means permit, may, too, feed on what he likes, but the economist 
must first consider essentials, not preferences or prejudices. But I find 
I must push forward, for 1 dare not pursue fancy too far in a paper of 
twenty minutes length. 
After the determination of what is essential for the maintenance of 
life we must consider the labour question. Which of the four systems 
under which we have divided the question of cultivation employs the 
largest amount of labour, and in which are our labourers the mos^ 
happily and healthily engaged ? Unhesitatingly, with firmest decision, 
we answer, In fruit production. Quite lately I, by chance, became the 
travelling companion of one of the largest agriculturists in our county, 
whose farm lands had been laid down to grass. He had given up corn 
for cattle, and he told me that as a result fifteen cottages were at 
that moment standing empty. So far as farm labourers were concerned 
he had no further use for them, and they had gone—where ? He did 
not know, but in all probability to swell the already congested popula¬ 
tion of the towns. How are we to get our open-faced, honest-hearted 
country population back to the green lanes and the gardens ? 
One of the best methods is the development of the industry of fruit 
production. But is our climate such as to encourage safely the cultiva¬ 
tion of hardy fruits ? Let us not commit the often rash errors of a too 
eager enthusiasm. I do not know which most to pity or blame—the 
blind optimist who to every question suggesting the possibility of big 
profits, Arcadian delights, and a contented population always basking 
in the sunshine of ease and unconcern, replies, “ I answer enthusiastically 
—Yes or the poor pessimist who says our Apples are only Crabs ; 
that there is a worm at every core; that the glory has departed, and 
we are all tumbling into the Slough of Despond. 
But there is a via media. It is possible to make the crooked 
straight, and the rough places plain, if we only set ourselves heartily to 
find the more excellent way. 
Hardy fruits can be grown, and well grown, in this much-despised 
climate of ours ; but, like everything else, it must be done properly. 
No more subtle sweetness, crispness, and altogether right flavour can 
lurk beneath the skin of Apple or Pear than can be found in the flesh 
of a British-grown Cox’s Orange or Ribston Pippin, or some of our best 
Pears, and no sprightly sauciness of brisk acidity can be found in the 
often insipid flavour of many of the foreign sub-acid Apples to com¬ 
pare with that of a northern grown Keswick or Lord Suffield. 
There are those about us, and apparently warmly interested in this 
movement, who go to extremes in both directions. In this problem of 
production let us remember we have all tastes to suit, all palates to 
please, and therefore a wide range for our catering. One cannot help 
being amused to read that somebody’s Pippin, which is the Apple of 
the future for the essence of its sweetness and syrupy juiciness, to which 
sugar would be a superfluity if not an absolute detraction; and in 
another week’s issue of the same journal the merit of somebody else’s 
seedling, which is to be the Apple of the future, is found in and founded 
on the fact that its beautiful tartness of flavour is such as absolutely to 
defy the seductive influence of sugar or syrup, bringing it to the dull 
level of the popular palate which can only take its Strawberries when 
reduced to a kind of saccharine paste, which can only take Currants as 
preserves, or Cherries in brandy. 
So long as opinions differ so widely we need not fear the unavoidable 
influence of climate in any of the home districts upon the qualities of 
our British-grown fruit. 
AA^hilst admitting of a certain amount of healthy variation in the 
quality of the fruits I would venture to say that the error of the past 
has been rather in the multiplication of kinds than in the other direc¬ 
tion. Some people have prided themselves upon having as many 
varieties as they can count trees in their orchards, but I couldneversee 
the full force of the benefit of such possession. It is well to choose but 
few kinds, letting them be such as are suitable to the district and such 
as commend themselves as market favourites. 
For instance, in the larger Lancashire towns Apples of a brisk sharp 
flavour find much readier sale than the sweeter fruits for which there 
may probably be greater demand in the south. If you can sell at 
