276 
THE FLOEIST AND POMOLOGIST. 
[ Deoembee, 
blue berries ; a fine hardy decorative climber for autumn.— Mr, J. Woodhridge : 
Oct. 7. 
Grape Mrs. Pearson [f.o.o.]. —A seedling white grape of the Frontignan 
type, the bunch of fair size and compact, with roundish-oval berries of a pale 
yellow colour, and fine flavour. Promises to make a useful late white Grape.— 
Mr. J. H. Pearson: R.H.S.i~Nov. 11. 
Grape Venn’s Seedling Black Muscat [f.c.c.] —An early-ripening variety 
of the Muscat section, with handsome oval berries of a good colour, and a very 
agreeable flavour, produced on large well-shouldered bunches.— Mr. Sweeting: 
It.H.S..f Aug. 19. 
Pear Lucy Grieve [f.c.c.]. —A fine handsome variety, ripening in October, 
of juicy and delicious flavour. It is of ovate outline, of a fine yellow colour, 
and with a tender, melting flesh.— Mr. P. Grieve: P.H.S.^ Nov. 11. 
Pear Pitmaston Duchess d’Angouleme [f.c.c.].—A richly flavoured and 
fine variety; delicious and melting; and beginning to find its way into the most 
select collections.— Rev. Geo. Kemp: R.H.S., Nov. 11 . 
FKUIT-CULTUKE versus CKEMATION. 
EFOEE Cremation has taken firm footing with the masses, let me beg a 
comer of the Florist and Pomologist to enable me to set down one or 
two facts which bear at least indirectly, if not directly, on the subject of 
this new style of sepulture. I had occasion, only the other day, to visit a 
gentleman at his business office, and on a baize-covered table there lay two very 
fine samples of Pears. Some thirty or forty of the larger sample were the finest 
of that variety I had ever seen. I naturally asked if they had not been grown 
on a wall, and learned that they had. Again, I questioned if this feat had been 
accomplished in Lancashire, and was told it had been. We both agreed that 
great credit was due to the grower, whoever he might be, for such splendid pro¬ 
ductions. I tasted one fmit, and found it melting and luscious. On further 
inquiry, I found that the gentleman was an amateur fruit-grower, and sold what 
he did not need for his own use, or for the use of his friends; and that he had 
sold the stock of which these were the sample at 6s. per peck of 16 lb.—say, 4Jd. 
per lb.—to a fruiterer to sell again. This item tells the quality of the fmit, that 
would thus cost 6d. per lb. to the retail buyer. The other sample consisted of 
Pears of small size, but they made amends for that by their numbers and their 
quality; indeed, large Pears and Apples, unless their characters stand high, are 
looked upon with some suspicion as dessert fruits. 
But some one will think, if he does not say. What have these Pears to do with 
Cremation ? I answer. Nothing! Certainly nothing whatever! But when I tell 
the reader that these clusters of small Pears and those delicious large Pears were 
grown upon a wall dividing the garden of this amateur from the churchyard—I 
had rather not name the parish, but it is not a hundred miles from Manchester— 
and that the foundation of the wall is favourable to the extension of the roots to 
both sides, he will see the bearing these fruits have on the subject. 
