Let us now look at an absolute experiment conducted avowedly upon the Van Mons plan in our own country, upon the fertile soil of the State of Illinois, and see to what results it led:—
The following facts have been elicited from correspondence with H.P. Brayshaw, of Du Quoin, Illinois. The experiments were instituted by his father many years ago, to test the truth of the Van Mons' theory of the improvement of fruits by using only the first seeds.
Thirty-five years ago, in 1827, his father procured twenty-five seedling trees from a nursery, which may be supposed to have been an average lot, grown from promiscuous seed. These were planted, and when they came into bearing, six of them furnished fruit that might be called "good" and of these, "four were considered fine." One of the six is still in cultivation, and known as the Illinois Greening. Of the remainder of the trees, some of the fruits were fair, and the rest were worthless, and have disappeared.
Second Generation.—The first fruits of these trees were selected, and the seeds were sown. Of the resulting crop, some furnished fruit that was "good," but they do not appear to have merited much attention.
Third Generation.—From first seeds of the above, one hundred trees were produced, some of which were good fruit, and some "even fine," while some were very poor, "four or five only merited attention." So that we see a retrogression from the random seedlings, furnishing twenty-five per cent, of good fruit, to only four or five per cent. in the third generation, that were worthy of note.
Fourth Generation.—A crop of the first seed was again sown, producing a fourth generation; of these many were "good culinary fruits," none, or very few being of the "poorest class of seedlings," none of them, however, were fine enough "for the dessert."
Fifth Generation.—This crop of seedlings was destroyed by the cut-worms, so that only one tree now remains, but has not yet fruited. But Mr. Brayshaw appears to feel hopeful of the results, and promises to continue the experiment.
Crops have also been sown from some of these trees, but a smaller proportion of the seedlings thus produced were good fruits, than when the first seeds were used—this Mr. Brayshaw considers confirmatory evidence of the theory, though he appears to feel confidence in the varieties already in use, most of which had almost an accidental origin.
He thinks the result would have been more successful had the blossoms been protected from impregnation by other trees, and recommends that those to be experimented with should be planted at a distance from orchards, so as to avoid this cross-breeding, and to allow of what is called breeding in-and-in. If this were done, he feels confident that "the seedlings would more nearly resemble the parent, and to a certain extent would manifest the tendency to improvement, and that from the earliest ripened fruits, some earlier varieties would be produced, from those latest ripening, later varieties, from those that were inferior and insipid, poor sorts would spring, and that from the very best and most perfect fruits we might expect one in one thousand, or one-tenth of one per cent., to be better than the parent." This diminishes the chance for improvement to a beautifully fine point upon which to hang our hopes of the result of many generations of seedlings occupying more than a lifetime of experiments.
Mr. Brayshaw, citing some of the generally adopted axioms of breeders of animals, assumes that crosses, as of distinct races, will not be so likely to produce good results, as a system of breeding in-and-in, persistently carried out. This plan he recommends, and alludes to the quince and mulberry as suitable species to operate upon, because in them there are fewer varieties, and therefore less liability to cross-breeding, and a better opportunity for breeding in-and-in. He also reminds us of the happy results which follow the careful selection of the best specimens in garden flowers and vegetables, combined with the rejection of all inferior plants, when we desire to improve the character of our garden products, and he adopts the views of certain physiologists, which, however, are questioned by other authorities, to the effect that violent or decided crosses are always followed by depreciation and deterioration of the offspring.
The whole communication referring to these experiments, which are almost the only ones, so far as I know, which have been conducted in this country to any extent, to verify or controvert the Van Mons' theory, is very interesting, but it is easy to perceive that the experimenter, though apparently very fair, and entirely honest, has been fully imbued with the truth and correctness of the proposition of Van Mons, that the first ripened seed of a natural plant was more likely to produce an improved variety, and that this tendency to improvement would ever increase, and be most prominent in the first ripened seeds of successive generations grown from it.
The theory of Van Mons I shall not attempt in this place to controvert, but will simply say that nothing which has yet come under my observation has had a tendency to make me a convert to the avowed views of that great Belgian Pomologist, while, on the contrary, the rumors of his opponents, that he was really attempting to produce crosses from some of the best fruits, as our gardeners have most successfully done in numerous instances, in the beautiful flowers and delicious vegetables of modern horticulture, have always impressed me with a color of probability, and if he were not actually and intentionally impregnating the blossoms with pollen of the better varieties, natural causes, such as the moving currents of air, and the ever active insects, whose special function in many instances appears to be the conveyance of pollen, would necessarily cause an admixture, which, in a promiscuous and crowded collection, like the "school of Van Mons," would at least have an equal chance of producing an improvement in some of the resulting seeds.
The whole subject of variation in species, the existence of varieties, and also of those partial sports, which may perhaps be considered as still more temporary variations from the originals, than those which come through the seeds, is one of deep interest, well worthy of our study, but concerning which we must confess ourselves as yet quite ignorant, and our best botanists do not agree even as to the specific distinctions that have been set up as characters of some of our familiar plants, for the most eminent differ with regard to the species of some of our common trees and plants.
RUNNING OUT OF VARIETIES
It has been a very generally received opinion among intelligent fruit-growers, that any given variety of fruit can have but a limited period of existence, be that longer or shorter. Reasoning from the analogies of animal life this would appear very probable, for it is well known that individuals of different species all have a definite period of life, some quite brief, others quite extended, beyond which they do not survive. But with our modern views of vegetation, though we know that all perennial plants do eventually die and molder away to the dust from whence they were created, and that many trees of our own planting come to an untimely end, while we yet survive to observe their decay, still, we can see no reason why a tree or parts of a tree taken from it, and placed under circumstances favorable to its growth from time to time, may not be sempiternal. Harvey has placed this matter in a correct light, by showing that the true life and history of a tree is in the buds, which are annual, while the tree itself is the connecting link between them and the ground. Any portion of such a compound existence, grafted upon another stock, or planted immediately in the ground itself and established upon its own roots, will produce a new tree like the first, being furnished with supplies of nourishment it may grow indefinitely while retaining all the qualities of the parent stock—if that be healthy and vigorous so will this—indeed new life and vigor often seem to be imparted by a congenial thrifty stock, and a fertile soil, so that there does not appear to be any reason why the variety should ever run out and disappear.
The distinguished Thomas Andrew Knight, President of the London Horticultural Society, was one of the leading advocates of the theory that varieties would necessarily run out and disappear as it were by exhaustion.
In his