The fruit cultivator

Front matter

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Introduction

The cultivation of fruits, whether native or exotic, is a principal part of the business of the gardener; and, in many places, orcharding is an important branch of rural economy. Few objects are more engaging than the culture of fruit. The very act of planting a fruit tree is attended with a pleasing hope. Seeing it year after year advancing to a bearing state, is interesting ; and witnessing it at last loaded with, or bending under, its burden of fruit, is at once as gratifying as it is a profitable spectacle.

Many books have been written on this subject ; some of them, when the art was in its

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infancy, and when sufficient experience had not matured the rules of practice. These have become obsolete : and there are also several modern publications of great merit, in which science and extensive practical knowledge have been united ; which have gained public approval and patronage ; and as these embrace every branch of the fruit-grower's duty, may on this account be deemed complete. But such is the vast variety of garden and orchard fruit, — such the diversity of circumstances which aflPect the growth of the trees, the size and qualities of the fruit, — and such the great number of new sorts and new modes of treatment discovered, — that no one book can possibly contain a moiety of the knowledge necessary^ for a general cultivator. Nor can a complete w^ork on the subject ever be compiled, unless every man of long experience do for himself and the public what the Author of the following pages has endeavoured to perform.

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He has, during a long life of varied and active lemployment, made and kept notes of the results of his practice ; and w^hich he now^ in his eighty-third year, is induced to offer to the young gardener and nurseryman, as a fund of information which he trusts will not be found unworthy of their notice.

The book differs from many others which have preceded it, chiefly in this, — that, whereas former works only give general directions as regards the management of the different species, this enters into minute details, not only respecting the species, but of every variety and subvariety which the Author has found to be really worth cultivation. The whole is derived from actual practice ; and nothing advanced, of which the Author cannot vouch for the truth. He has employed the plainest language, as he disapproves of the use of botanical or scientific terms in the descriptions of fruit, or of any matter relative

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INTRODUCTION.

to the culture : in fact, all practical matters cannot be too plainly treated of. Were the Writer disposed to be critical on this head, he could point to instances where much very fine language has been thrown away, in describing one of our commonest apples ; but as this is unnecessary, he has studiously avoided every term, the import of which may not be understood by the meanest capacity. For the same reason, he has avoided all allusions to the physiology of trees ; not only because the doctrines of that science are not very well defined, but some of them actually contrary to nature. For instance, what is said concerning the autumnal descent of the sap, — a circumstance which the Author has never observed, nor can he bring himself to believe ever takes place.

The book might have been much enlarged, if the Author could have been persuaded to have added opinions and practices borrowed

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from others ; but this would have been an imposition too often practised, but which is, to say the least of it; very unfair. And without pretending that all that is herein detailed is original, or exclusively his own, he can aflSrm, that such as it is, if duly attended to, may be depended upon as main-chance practice^ leading to no disappointment.

He might have also added to the bulk of his book, by relating all he knew of the many leading characters as gardeners and nurserymen, who flourished in the last century — contemporaries of his earlier days. This might have been interesting to some few readers ; but as such matters are not immediately connected with the main purpose of the work, they have been suppressed ; except a few anecdotes which the Writer could not well withhold, connected as they are either with the fruit described, Avith some rule of practice enjoined, or as examples of successful exertion

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or eminent ability. The memory and services of such persons should be kept on record, as^ well as a mark of honour to the defunct, as an incentive to the rising generation to tread in their steps.

In concluding these introductory remarks^ the Writer has to add a piece of advice to hisyoung readers, which, as he found it of much use to himself, he can recommend the more confidently. It is this : — in whatever place^ station, or situation, a young man may find himself placed while in pursuit of his business^ always to keep a diary or register of the various labours done by himself or his companions for every day in the year. Such a book of memoranda, kept with steadiness and care for three or four successive years, will form a body of practical information which will be of the greatest service to the possessor to the last hour of his professional life. A calendar of the weather should be kept at the same time ;

INTRODUCTION,

XI because this frequently expedites or retards the operations of the gardener, and on it depends the time of growth and period of maturation of all garden crops. It is from numerous memoranda of this kind, made in early youth, that the Author has been enabled in his riper years to arrive at sound conclusions, and in his old age to offer them as a bequest to those who succeed, when he shall be no more."

J. R.

Southampton Nursery, October, 1834.