There remains a very different class of apple-trees, grown only for ornament and usually known as "flowering apples." They are mostly native in China and Japan. They are small trees, or even almost bushes, with profuse handsome flowers and some of them with very ornamental little fruits. They have come to this country largely from Japan where they are grown for decoration, as the cherries of Japan are grown not for fruit but for their flowers, being of very different species from the cherries of Europe and America. The common apple itself yields varieties grown only for ornament, as one with variegated leaves, one with double flowers, and one with drooping branches. These are known mostly in Europe; but these forms do not compare in interest with the handsome species of the Far East. All these differing species of the apple-tree multiply the interest and hold the attention in many countries. They make the apple-tree group one of the most widespread and adaptable of temperate-region trees. It will be seen that there are three families of them,--the Eurasian family, from which come the pomological apples; the North American family, which has yielded little cultivated material; the East-Asian family, abundant in highly ornamental kinds. There are no apple-trees native in the southern hemisphere. The apple-tree, taken in its general sense, has a broad meaning. What may be accomplished by breeding and hybridizing is beyond imagination. XI THE VARIETIES OF APPLE Every seedling of the pomological apples is a new variety. Some of these seedlings are so good that they are named and introduced into cultivation. They are grafted on other stocks, and become part of the great inheritance of desirable apples. It is to be expected that in the long processes of time in many countries the number of varieties will accumulate to high numbers. No one knows all the kinds that have been named and propagated, but they run into many thousands. No one book contains them all, although some of the manuals are voluminous. Varieties drop out of existence, being no longer propagated; new varieties come in. So the lists of varieties gradually change. A list of one hundred years ago would contain many names strange to us. Thus, of the sixty apples in "A Select List of Fruit-Trees" by Bernard M'Mahon, published in "The American Gardener's Calendar," in 1806, not more than six or eight would be understandable to a planter of the present day.