THERE are two classes of people who plant peaches: the great number of farmers, gardeners, and amateur pomologists who grow them for private use only, and who should be governed in their planting by quite different considerations than those controlling the market-grower, constitute the first, and far the most important class. A majority of the American people own or occupy, and to some extent cultivate a sufficient quantity of land to make it possible for them to grow much, if not all the fruit which their families consume. It is quite possible, that in many instances it may cost more to grow it at home than to buy an equal quantity in the market; but there are abundant reasons why many varieties of fruit should be home-grown, even at some additional expense. The leading advantage is, that if we grow our fruits at home we have them, and it is not always convenient or possible to buy according to our tastes. The fruits we grow ourselves, we can have in their greatest perfection and beauty, and this is generally impossible to secure in the market.

Fruit picked for shipment to distant markets, cannot be allowed to reach perfect maturity, and the damages incident to transportation and sale destroy most of that delicacy of beauty and flavor belonging to fine fruits, before they reach our tables.

But more important than these considerations of health and physical enjoyment, I would suggest the moral and aesthetic value of growing fruits, to one's family and one's self. Good fruits are a civilizer. They appeal to every finer faculty. They are especially an educator of children. We all look back to those days when we played in the green shadows of the old apple trees, or shook down their crimson burden in harvest time, as among the brightest and most sacred of our childhood. The man who fails to plant a market orchard, may not be impeached for neglect of duty; but any man, who, having land and a family, neglects to plant fruit tress, is morally guilty: for beyond all pecuniary interests, the use of fruits is essential to health ; and the beautiful and varied lessons of their growth contribute to the finest moral culture. So let every owner of a bit of land plant "Fruits that shall swell in sunny June, And redden in the August noon. And drop, as gentle airs come by That fan the blue September sky: While children wild with noisy glee Shall scent their fragrance as they pass, And search for them the tufted grass."

As I would have the largest possible number of the people grow fruits of all kinds for home supply, I write these lines to encourage a more general planting of peaches, even in those districts where they need some artificial protection. Hence, I say that the right location in which to plant peach trees, in sufficient number for family supply, is on every man's farm, and in every garden of reasonable extent. There are few locations, indeed, within the limits of our republic, elevated mountain sites excepted, where a very moderate expenditure will not fit the soil for a few trees, and guard them against extreme and destructive cold.

Peach trees, while having considerable choice of soil, will, nevertheless, grow in almost any soil capable of sustaining other vegetable growths, if it is not excessively wet; and this difficulty can be overcome, in most cases cheaply, by drainage. Our American summers are everywhere long, warm, and bright enough to ripen peaches very perfectly, if we can only preserve the trees and fruit buds through the severe winters of the North. This has been done in a sufficient number of cases to justify the declaration that it can be done generally along our Northern borders. The well-ripened wood and fruit buds of the peach tree will generally endure the cold of ten to fifteen degrees below zero without injury, especially if protected against severe and drying winds. Large crops of peaches are annually grown in orchards exposed to this degree of frost. Any method of protection which will shield the trees against a greater degree of cold than ten below zero, will doubtless carry a crop safely through. Several plans have been adopted with success.

A long tried plan is to grow the tree against the southern side of the wall, which is the universal custom in England, and in portions of France. The branches are trained along the wall horizontally in both directions from the stem, and fastened occasionally to hold them in place. Corn fodder or straw may be packed against the trees before very cold weather, and held in place by poles, or in any cheap way. The wall may be simply a close high board fence, backed with earth or sods; or trees may be trained to a trellis like grapes, and protected as above; or they may be branched a few inches above the ground, and the branches trained horizontally very near the ground by tying to stakes, and protected by covering with straw. Trees grown in either of these ways, may be protected from the ravages of the curculio, by the Ransom process of trapping, so often described. Again, trees may be grown in large pots or tubs, as they are for glass-house culture, and moved into the cellar for winter, and plunged in the soil in summer. This plan dwarfs the trees, which is favorable to early fruiting: they are easily managed, and are very pleasing objects in the garden.

Either of the methods of artificial culture suggested, possesses the obvious advantage over open orchard culture, that the winter protection can be retained until the danger from spring frosts is passed, giving a great certainty of crops. This security of crop will go far towards balancing the expense of protection. I have known years of general failure of the peach crop in the West, when some such measures as above suggested, would have proven remunerative in saving a crop for market. A small number of bushels of fruit, at ten dollars per bushel, would pay more net cash than some full crops in large orchards have done. But I assume that it will always pay the lover of choice peaches to produce them at this extra expense, in any neighborhood where they cannot be grown in the open garden.

South Pass, III., December, 1872.