January 8, 1887. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
297 
The results were probably disastrous to the orchardist, 
and the practice was, no doubt, soon discontinued. 
Pear trees are supposed to be indicated in the twenty- 
third verse of the fifth chapter of the second Book of 
Samuel, but the word is more generally held to apply 
to the Mulberry. Dr. Karl Koch, writing to M. 
Andre Leroy in 1865, says, “ I am certain, now that 1 
have passed several years in the thinly populated 
countries of the Caucasus, Asia Minor, Armenia and 
Persia, that all the European Pears are species become 
wild in our forests, and that in no case are they in¬ 
digenous.” 
The Pears of the 17th Century. 
In 1665 John Pea, gent., published the Flora, 
Ceres and Pomona in which he gives a list of twenty- 
one Pears described as being very good, one of them 
rejoicing in the extraordinary name of the “ Dead 
Man’s Pear.” He describes the Winter Bon Chretien 
as one of the most excellent, but requiring to be grafted 
on the Quince stock and trained to a wall. He also 
says, “that there are several good sorts of Wardens 
and baking Pears.” In 1693 
John Evelyn published a 
translation of the works of 
Monsieur de la Quintinye, a 
very voluminous, exact and 
twaddling French author. 
In advising the setting out 
of a plantation of dwarf 
Pear trees, he begins with 
the choice of a dwarf tree to 
be planted alone— i.e., the 
Winter Bon Chretien, giving 
several reasons for this pre¬ 
ference. “1, Because of its 
antiquity, and that by its 
singular excellence it gained 
the admiration and court¬ 
ship of the world, the great 
monarchies, and principally 
that of old Borne having 
known and cultivated it 
under the name of Crustu- 
mium. 2, It was baptised 
at the very birth of Chris¬ 
tianity itself, and, con¬ 
sequently, it should have 
the veneration of all Chris¬ 
tian gardeners. 3, It should 
be considered of itself and 
with respect only to its 
own proper merit, which 
can alone entitle it to a 
preference.” This is, at all 
events, a very proper de¬ 
cision to arrive at, but the 
Winter Bon Chretien has not 
kept the high rank assigned 
to it. De la Quintinye in¬ 
dulges in the most extrava¬ 
gant expressions of esteem : 
‘ ‘ That it grows to the weight 
of 2 lbs., that it is con¬ 
sidered a handsome present to persons of quality, and 
that it is a Pear the beauty of which has caused the 
ablest gardeners to labour for it with the greatest 
passion.” I have had a good experience of Pears, but 
I have never known this precious Pear except by name, 
but it may have degenerated, or we of the present time 
are more particular in our tastes. Of the other varieties 
named by Mons. de la Quintinye, the Autumn Berga¬ 
mot, the St. Germain, the Colmar and Crassane have 
survived to our own time, but without holding rank as 
a first class fruit ; he, however, highly commends the 
Beurre Bouge, classing this as a synonym of the 
B. d’Ambroise and Isambert, which he says, “possesses 
the first degree of goodness—viz., a smooth delicious 
softness with a fine delicate pulp,” wasting many good 
epithets on the Winter Bon Chretien, which would 
have been more properly applied to the Beurre Bouge. 
The Autumn Bergamot is not highly commended, 
although our friend says, “that it has a numerous and 
formidable party, and, indeed, that a thousand people 
assert that for its tender and melting pulp, its sweet and 
sugary juice, and the little smack of perfume which 
accompanies it, that it is more valuable than all other 
Pears in general”—remarks which a great many ignorant 
people make at the present day. De la Quintinye 
names some ninety or hundred sorts of which some of 
the names are expressive, as “Greedy Guts,” “Chew 
Good,” “Daughter of God,” or “ Fille Dieu.” Some 
few of the sorts remain, among them the Bousselets, 
Chaumontel and St. Lezin. De la Quintinye’s reasons 
for the enjoyment of Pears are curious. He states 
that “the rigorous cold which lasts from November to 
March enjoins our placing ourselves near the fire, and 
that to counteract the external foreign heat then taken 
in, nature has provided us with Pears to prevent the 
great infirmities which might happen to us from the 
enjoyment of so much heat. So precisely at this time 
she has given us an admirable quantity of tender fruit, 
such as Bergamots, Louise Bonnes, Les Chasseries, 
Amberts, Virgoulees, Epines and St. Augustines.’’ 
This garrulous author provides for the plantation of a 
thousand trees, but states that “the planter of so many 
would be a curious gentleman, for how could he dispose 
of 12,000 Pears unless he gave them away or made 
perry of them l ’’ This difficulty would not be felt 
now. He concludes his remarks on Pears by a list of 
fifty good, forty-four indifferent, and sixty-six bad sorts. 
Eighteenth Century Varieties. 
In 1729, Batty Langley, in the Pomona, gives the 
names of fifty-seven Pears. Those which are named 
by him, and still cultivated, are the Brown Beurre, 
Autumn Bergamot, Hampden’s ditto, Crassane, Epine 
d’Hiver, Jargonelle, Swan’s Egg and Windsor ; and 
among baking Pears, the Black Pear of Worcester and 
Catillac. Mr. Langley is not enthusiastic about Pears. 
Switzer enumerates eighty Pears, advising the 
planting of the English Bergamot, “because of its 
goodness and antiquity, it being not impossible that it 
has been an inhabitant of this island ever since Julius 
Caesar conquered it, and that possibly it was the 
Assyrian Pear of Virgil, and was, as may be deduced 
from this, a part of the celebrated Gardens of Alcinous. ” 
A tree of this sort in the Sawbridgeworth Nurseries is 
said to be 300 years old. The Pears selected by 
Switzer appear certainty to have been the best of that 
time, and he testifies to the extreme goodness of the 
Winter Bon Chretien. 
Philip Miller, in his Gardeners’ Dictionary, 1759, 
begins his list with Petit Muscat, and passes on to the 
Ohio, Citron des Cannes, La Bellissime, bearing two 
crops in July and September, Jargonelle and Cuisse 
Madame. The Cuisse Madame of the French is classed 
as a good Pear, and the Jargonelle as third-rate ; but 
Mons. Leroy describes the Cuisse Madame as a small 
inferior Pear, ripening about the end of August, con¬ 
sidering it as one of the few historical Greek Pears 
which have come down to us. The Poire d’Epargne, or 
Jargonelle of Andre Leroy, does not correspond with 
the outline of our Jargonelle, and he does not praise 
the fruit, calling it good only for the season. Our 
true English Jargonelle, when ripened on a wall, is ex¬ 
ceeding good, juicy and refreshing. Probably, the 
spurious Jargonelle, which undoubtedly exists, has 
been introduced by those who have imported this sort 
from France, having been misled by the name, not 
being aware that the Jargonelle of the French nurseries 
is not the kind which passes under that name with us. 
Leroy says that Miller has muddled the Jargonelle, 
and that the confusion caused by him has lasted to our 
own time, the mischief arising from the JargoneBe and 
Cuisse Madame being classed by Mills as synonymous. 
Miller names eighty sorts, and states that he has 
included in his list many sorts that are not worth 
planting to please those who are fond of a great variety. 
He is aware of the eccentri¬ 
city 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 fit 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 equivalent in 
1886. In reference to this 
matter, Miller says that ‘ 1 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¬ 
ing 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 po¬ 
mology 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, en¬ 
titled A Guide to the Orchard 
and Kitchen Garden. The list of Pears is here brought 
down to nearly 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 Van 
Mons, Nelis, and others. According to Lindley, many 
of these are not worth much, the Duchess d’Angouleme 
and Beurre Diel being credited with special praise, the 
Marie Louise, however, not being very highly com¬ 
mended. In 1842, the Boyal Horticultural Society 
published a list of 442 sorts, and Dr. Hogg, in 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 show 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, 
a fruit that is far superior to any of those noticed by 
Lindley in 1831. 
It is curious that Shakespeare, country bred, should 
never have mentioned Pears by name, save once in 
“Borneo and Juliet,” when he alludes to the Popperiu 
