Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1889-07-20
CONCERNING PEACHES.
The Outlook For washington's Supply
and Trade This Season.

LIMA PEAcHEs-THK LOCAL SUPPLY AND PRICES
The peach is fruit that needs no advocacy.
requires no defense. But for the fact that it
would so soon be victimized by some tempted
gourmand plump and perfect specimen could
travel further on its merits, perhaps, than any
similar product of tree or vine. We have but
to think Of them arranged with vicious and ex-
asperating beauty by vendors or grocers, when,
the imagination working upon the nerves and
the nerves acting upon the glands of taste, pro-
duee that peculiar watering of the mouth-the
evidence of something wished for, the mani
festation of something unseen
1t is the farmers happy privilege to have
this luscious fruit hanging upon the trees until
it is at its best while the city folk must take it
as they can get it. To eat peach in the acme
of its lusciousness is to go into the orchard, and
plucking the soft melting fruit from the tree
press out the juicy, delicious pulp from each
half into the mouth, retaining the rough scab-
rous skin between the fingers. 1t is then only
that all the richness OF taste and delicacy OF
flavor are obtained and the palate OF the happy
individual treated beyond compare. peach
taken from the tree when hard-to ripen en-
route to markets. better than no peach, but is
not to be mentioned in the same list with those
gathered fresh and ripe from the parent stem.
an Edens grove, six thousand years sxo,
An apple brought the world to serious woe;
Yet might forgive them had IL been peach"
ANTIQUITY OF THE PEACH.
The peach is an ancient fruit, and il seems
singular that no mention is made of it in the
Bible for it known to have been introduced into
Italy early at least the time of Cladius,
AID. co. 1t was known then as the perstche,
owing doubtless to importation from Persia.
There is a difference of opinion to whether
its origin belongs to Persia or China. Under
the name of to-" or 'tdO," it was discussed by
Confucius five centuries before the Christian
era. Much later Virgil spoke of it, saying:
For downy peaches and the glossy plum"
The peach was not known in England or
France until about the middle of the sixteenth
century. Its French name is peche. from
which is probably derived our English word
peach. Its cultivation has never been a success
IN either of these countries, while in China, in
all probability its original home, every con-
ditiOn is admirably fitted for it, and there it
reaches its highest degree of perfection, those
grown in and about Pekin being the finest,
largest and most delicious the world can pro-
duce.
1t was not until the close Of the seventeenth
century Q6s0) that the peach was introduced
into this country, where it can be given any
latitude to suit its fancy, humored with any
sort OF climate or soil it may demand.
ITS FAMILY RELATIVES.
Through the nectarine the peach is closely
connected to the almond and by the almond to
the apricot. plum and cherry. The French
draw no distinction between the peach and
neetarine other than to regard the one a smooth
and the other downy fruit Their affinity is
proved by the fact that both have been frequent
ly grown not only from the same tree but from
the same branch, and, what is more, il has been
known to grow and mature with Of its
sides smooth and the other covered with the
ordinary fuzz. The kernel has the strong
flavor of tho hitter aIrnnn1 which ia dino
as in the almond, to the presence of
prussic acid. In ancient times the peach was
regarded as poisonous, and it is a tradition
that king of Persia once sent a quantity of
them into Egypt for the purpose of poisoning
the inhabitants. Perhaps in those days the
seed contained sufficiency of this deadly acid
to permeate the fruit and render ii unfit and
too dangerous for use, and that in the course
of cultivation it has lost all of it except the
little it now contains. and to which in degree
1t owes its exquisite flavor.
One thing is indisputable-the ingenuity and
industry of man is ever ready to undertake the
improving OF what he thinks nature has badly
done, and his success is nowhere more evident
than in the matter of fruits. Whether the
peach does owe its existence to the almond, or
whether it had little private beginning of its
own, or whether Chinese or Persian industry
or Yankee ingenuity or all had hand in its de-
velopment we should be-indeed, are willing to
take it as it is, be thankful for the original gift
and pray for-an abundant season Of the i'm
proved article and many happy returns.
cULTIvATING THE TREE.
The peach tree is a quick bearer, three years
only being required from the planting of the
seed Instances have been quoted where trees
sixteen months old have borne fruit. stone
planted in autumn will vegetate in the follow
ing spring, grow three or four feet high. and
may be budded in August or September. Two
years thence, II left undisturbed, it will be
likely to produce small crop, and the ensuing
season bear abundantly if weather favored
The tree, as in the case of all fruit trees that
have been long under cultivation, cannot be
depended upon to produce a fruit from the
Seeding like that which distinguished its par
ent tree, though there are occasional exceptions
A few Of our standard varieties may boast of
English origin, If there be any credit in that,
but the most of them, and the best by far We
can claim our own, and the rich ripe article
fresh from its native twig will lay mighty close
up TO the reputation of oriental Pekin's level
best, leaving itz British cousin q long way
down the list.
The peach tree has the reputation of being
short lived, the growers in some countries be-
ing compelled to renew their orchards every
few years. Yet there is evidence that 1t will
live to tolerably good age il conditions are
propitious. In Virginia there are trees over
seventy years old and still in fairly flourish
ing condition, and there is one in France which
Is said TO have been standing now more than a
century.
DHFkhbST VARIETIES OF PEACHES.
The different varieties Of peaches now grown
in this country run up among the hundreds,
the number being about equally divided be-
tween the white and yellow-heshed The
stones differ in their relative length and
breadth. and the suture or line where the halves
of the stone join varies in prominence and the
markings or furrowings deeper in some
varieties than in Others. This would indicate the
degree removed by cultivation from the almond
and its genera.
THE PEAcH-GRowIyG DISTRICTS.
The great peach-growing region of the east
ern portion Of our country includes pretty
much all Of the state of Delaware and that is
not saying a great deal so far as the area is
concerned, those counties of Maryland and yir-
ginia which border on the Chesapeake bay.
the lower Piedmont and Underwater sections OF
Virginia and a portion of North Carolina. Traf-
tc In the Georgia peach is growing, too. and
annually more attention is being given to the
peaches from that state. But the center and
most hourishing portion Of the peach-growing
district Is Kent county, Delaware and Kent.
Queen Anne and Wicomico counties, Maryland.
These four counties generally furnish three
fourths Of the peninsula crop. New Jersey in
former years, was a noted peach-growing coun-
try, but from some cause, possibly from the
exhaustion Of certain needed elements in the
soil, the growing ceased to yield sufficient remu-
neration as q crop and but few, comparatively
speaking, are now grown in that state There