thing else well. It is only the well-conditioned
tree that yields its glorious harvest year by year.

VIII

HOW AN APPLE-TREE IS MADE

If the seeds of a Baldwin or Winesap apple are planted, we do not
expect to get a Baldwin or Winesap; we shall probably raise a very
inferior fruit. The apple has not been bred "true to seed" as has the
cabbage and sweet pea. To get the tree "true to name," of the desired
variety and with no chance of failure (barring accident), is one of
the niceties of horticulture. This is accomplished with great
precision and despatch.

The apple-tree is started from the seed. It cannot be grown freely by
means of cuttings, as can the grape and currant. In commercial
practice the seeds are collected mostly from cider mills or from
pomace. The seeds may be washed from the pomace, allowed to dry, and
then mixed in sand, charcoal, sawdust or other material to prevent
dessication and kept until spring, when they are sown. Or, if the land
is not so wet in winter that the seed will drown or be washed out, the
seed in the pomace (not separated) may be sown in autumn. The seeds
are sown in drills, after the manner of onions or turnips, one to two
or even three inches deep. They germinate readily in the cool of
spring, and the plants should reach a height of twelve inches and more
the first year.

If these plants were grown directly into bearing trees, it is
probable that no two trees would produce the same kind of fruit. Some
of the fruit might be summer apples, some of it winter apples, some
red, yellow or striped, some of it flat, oblong or spherical, most of
it sour but perhaps some of it sweet. Probably every kind would be
inferior to the parent stock or to standard varieties, although there
is a fair chance that a superior kind might originate from a field of
such plants.

Therefore, it is not the variety (that is, the top) that is wanted in
the raising of these numerous plants, but merely the roots, on which
desired varieties may be grown by the clever art of graftage. Yet not
even all the roots may be wanted, for the growing plants may differ or
vary in their stature and vigor as well as in their fruit. The
discriminating grower, therefore, discards the weak and puny treelings
at the digging time; or if the weak plants seem still to have promise,
they may be allowed to grow another year before they are dug for the
grafting.

This digging time is the autumn of the first year, when the