while the cavity is being described. It is long or short, slender or stout. In rather rare cases it is clubbed by the presence of a swelling or protuberence on the side. Such stem forms are rare, but are strikingly characteristic of certain varieties. Once in a great while Shallow, smooth Deep, folded Medium, wavy FIG. 13-DIFFERENT BASIN FORMATIONS other unusual forms are discovered, but when they are the pomologist must depend on his own ingenuity to fit them with happy descriptive terms. The basin is the depression at the apical end of the fruit, or at the end opposite the stem-the "blossom end," it is sometimes called. This is only less characteristic and important than the cavity, and requires critical study and painstaking description. The description follows very much the same lines as in the matter of the cavity. The basin is first shallow, medium deep, or deep (Fig. 13); next narrow, medium broad, or broad; then abrupt, rounded, sloping, or flaring; and lastly it is smooth, regular, irregular, wavy, plaited, or even crowned. This last term of description is applicable when the five ribs along the sides of the apple come to five separate knobs about the basin, forming a little crown. The crowned basin is not specially rare. is more common among apples grown on the Pacific coast in North America, but is most of all characteristic of the apples grown in the maritime countries of Europe. The common Yellow Bellflower furnishes the best example of it for the average American fruit grower. It The basin is very rarely marked with russet, or with some color other than the one covering the rest of the fruit. Of course, all such peculiarities of coloring or marking will be carefully mentioned in the description. The basin, with the calyx, constitutes the eye. Many pomologists, however, have been in the habit of using the term "eye" in all circumstances, substituting it entirely for the term "basin." Thus in many descriptions one may read "Eye so and so," which would be much better expressed "Basin so and so." The term "eye" can thus be dispensed with to advantage. The calyx, which is also sometimes ambiguously spoken of as the eye, rests in the middle of the basin. It is sometimes spoken of as the blossom, and though it is, in fact, a part of the original blossom, it is hardly more properly so than the apple itself, or the stem, or the seeds. The calyx may be large or small; it may be composed of long or short segments, and any peculiarity of this sort should be mentioned; it may be open, half open, or closed; and in many cases it is deciduous, when the leafy segments fall off altogether. The color of the fruit is always a prime character in the recognition of varieties in the mind of the experienced pomologist, but it is peculiarly difficult to describe in words. One should properly do what he can to distinguish in words the various tints of green, yellow, and red which he meets in apples and pears, but no great satisfaction is to be anticipated in this part of the work. The manner in which the color is distributed over the surface may be described with somewhat greater accuracy. It may appear as a mere blush on one cheek, or it may be washed all over the side. It may be splashed or striped upon the ground color, and the stripings may be bold and irreuglar, or they may be fine and regu lar. It is no uncommon occurrence to find two shades of red combined in the coloring of an apple, both being superposed on a ground color of green or yellow. Such a coloring should be specially mentioned. A fruit which is all of one solid color is said to be self-colored. The dots are very characteristic on some fruits, particularly on many apples. They vary in number, in size, and in color. In color they may be white, gray, or russet, or seldom of some other color. In form they may be round, irregular, or areolar. Areolar dots are such as usually have a small dot of russet in the center, surrounded by a more or less regular circle of white or gray. In certain cases the dots appear to be sunken, as in the Baldwin apple, and rarely they appear to be slightly raised above the surface. Finally they may be scattered miscellaneously over the surface of the fruit, they may be crowded, or they may be most numerous about the eye. |