January SI, ISSii. J 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
23 
■“ DEAL," in his comprehensive and genial New Year’s 
D., greeting refers to the progress that has been made in 
flower, vegetable, and fruit culture during the past year. In 
Tespect to the latter he says, “A great movement has taken place, 
and, as is usual with us, we have been rather inclined to ride the 
hobby to death. While there is no doubt much to be done by the 
better cultivation of better sorts, as has been well shown in the 
■Fruiterers’ Company’s prize essay on fruit growing, yet that 
fruit is ever in this country to take the place of any of our other 
products or drive the foreigner out of our markets is a wild 
■chimera.” Those sentences are worthy of repetition and brief 
comment. 
In preparing the essay referred to I endeavoured to avoid in- 
-dulgence in the extravagant utterances that have been far too 
common and certainly misleading in newspapers and magazines on 
dhe subject of fruit. Such statements as of £6,000,000 to 
J£8,000,000 being expended on fruits that “ might be grown at home ” 
have been so often repeated as to have sunk deep into the public 
mind as the truth. They are not true. The value of the im- 
•portations of Currants, Eaisins, Oranges, Lemons, Bananas, and 
vaiious other tropical fruits are included in the importations, 
and in fact form the chief bulk of them, and only a visionarv 
would suggest that the supply of them necessary for meeting 
^;he consumption in this country can be grown here ; and I am 
in entire accord with “D., Deal," that the idea of driving the 
foreigner out of our markets as a producer of fruit is a “ wild 
chimera.” I go further, and say if such a thing should by any 
possibility happen it would be a misfortune to us as a community. 
Instead of abusing the “ foreigner” for sending us such good, full, 
and generally cheap supplies of fruit of the nature indicated we 
■should thank him for his enterprise, and if home growers of hardy 
fruit have failed to produce more, and of the first marketable 
•quality, whose fault is it ? Not the “ foreigner’s ” surely. No, the 
fault is at home, and the most hopeful sign of the times is that it 
is at last admitted—hence the “ great movement ” referred to, 
and which will as surely result in more and better fruit being grown 
in this country as the sun will rise to-morrow. 
The fact that millions of bushels of Apples are brought from 
over the sea, and sold in our markets yearly, demonstrates the 
inadequacy of our home supplies, but not in bulk so much as in 
appearance. I am not quite sure the expression of my belief now 
to be recorded will not expose me to an avalanche of hostile 
criticism. That must be risked. My belief is that, weight for 
%veight, the practically worthless and unsaleable home-grown Apples 
in good Apple years exceed the importations of handsome-looking 
well sorted fruits that come from distant shores, and are sold in 
shops nearly all over the kingdom. I am convinced from not very 
limited observation that such is the fact, and I am equally con¬ 
vinced it ought not to be, and will not be in a few years’ time. If 
owners of exhausted orchards in different parts of the country are 
content to rely on their produce so much the worse for them, and 
so much the better for those more enlightened cultivators who are 
planting the best varieties in the best manner in the best soil at 
command, for the fruit from these trees, properly marketed, will 
geU at the least as well as any that can be brought from other lands, 
and probably better, for the best culinary Apples of Great Britain 
possess a piquancy and briskness all their own that is bound to be 
preferred to the comparatively insipid and “ flat ” tasted imported 
samples. The millions of purchasers in cities do not know this, 
because they see so little home-grown fruits good enough in appear¬ 
ance to tempt them to buy and find it out. They buy that which 
looks the best when prices are reasonable, and when they are not 
they go without. The first essential of fruit for sale is good 
appearance, as represented by size, uniformity in sample, and 
colour—not necessarily redness but clearness, though the British 
matron undoubtedly likes a “ bit o’ colour.” Yet well grown, firm, 
fleshy, juicy home-grown yellow Apples, free from specks and 
bruises, sell well at good prices to the grower when he has good 
crops to sell. 
This brings to the front another point that cannot be overlooked 
by practical men, and it is this—no matter how good the varieties, 
how suitable the soil, how skilled the cultural attention, good crops 
of Apples cannot be relied on with anything like certainty every 
year. The most correct methods of pruning may be practised, the 
best of manures employed, insects may be subdued, and perhaps 
caterpillars conquered ; but man with all his wisdom, though he 
may guide his trees into blossom and rejoice in their beauty, 
may be compelled to see it fall and leave little or no fruit behind. 
The organs of fructification may be imperfect, as was the case 
with so many last spring through the influence of the cold and wet 
preceding summer ; bright sunny days and keen frosty nights may 
occur during blossoming time, or a week or ten days of rain. All 
these are natural incidents that have happened in the past too 
frequently, leaving the trees barren, and they will occur in the 
future. From these visitations alone many persons who are plant¬ 
ing trees so hopefully, and counting on their yielding estimated 
amounts yearly, will sooner or later be greatly disappointed. There 
will be seasons in which they will have no fruit, just as during the 
past year thousands of trees in the best condition for bearing, and 
watched and cared for by the most expert cultivators, had not a 
fruit on them. That there are sanguine persons expecting more 
than they will realise from planting fruit trees is certain—some 
through the natural obstacles alluded to, others through errors in 
choice of varieties, and bad planting in unsuitable soil and unfavour¬ 
able situations. Acres of trees have been “ stuck in ” during the 
last two years in a manner and in soil in which they cannot thrive 
and prove remunerative. In this respect the “hobby is being 
ridden to death.” Sound information was never so much needed 
on the subject of fruit culture by so many persons as at the present 
time, and I cannot advise persons who have little or no experience 
to guide them, and little or no money to lose, to invest in one kind 
of fruit alone, such as Apples or Plums, as so many are disposed 
to do. They may find it weary waiting for the crops, and hard to 
live in the meantime, therefore I strongly urge the desirability 
of not overlooking what are known as small soft fruits for 
affording quick returns for immediate use and preserving. Any 
one kind of fruit—such as Apples, Plums, and Pears—is liable 
to fail ; but I have never known a year when all fruits have 
failed, and the small are more certain in bearing than the larger 
kinds. 
Another thing, and this brings me, perhaps, slightly in conflict 
with the dictum that “ fruit will never in this country take the 
place of any of our other products.” I think jam has taken the 
place of butter in the meal of many a hungry child. Thousands of 
such meals have from time to time been provided by the kindly 
disposed to children in Board schools in the poorer districts in 
London, and jam largely, palatably, and wholesomely, takes the place 
of grease in humble homes innumerable, and possibly in some that 
are not destitute of the comforts or even of the luxuries of life. 
But much jam is, comparatively speaking, horrid stuff, though 
more, I am glad to believe, is excellent. For pure, wholesome, 
first class jam, in which the fruit is not smashed to obscure its 
identity, we ought, with our facilities for its production, and the 
No. 498.—VoL. XX., Third Series. 
No. 2154.—VoL. LXXXII., Old Series. 
