Pear-trees of enormous size survive on other sites of old French settlements in the United States to show what notable horticulturists the early missionaries of this people were, who, we are many times told in the early records, usually surrounded their missions and homes with trees of the apple, peach, pear, and cherry. Pear-trees very like those found about the French settlements in Canada and Michigan still grow in the rich intervale lands of the Wabash and Mississippi in Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri. Vincennes, Indiana, was settled by the French in 1702; Kaskaskia and Cahokia, Illinois, about 1685; St. Louis, Missouri, in 1764. These may be set down as approximate dates in which horticulture began in these inland regions. When the English conquered these settlements they found giant pear-trees which persisted well into the last century, the second generation of which were scattered far and wide in the river settlements of this region. Tradition says that a Monsieur Girardin, a native of France, planted a pear orchard from seeds he brought with him at Cahokia about 1780, from which came the Prairie du Pont pear, a small, roundish, lemon-colored fruit similar to the French pears of Detroit, borne on an immense blight-proof tree. No doubt the variety could still be found in this part of the Mississippi valley. One wishes that the American-born descendants and the conquerers of these early settlers from Normandy were as energetic in forwarding horticulture as the first settlers. After the invasion of the English and later the Americans, there is little evidence of progress in horticulture in this region, until the early years of the nineteenth century. Another famous pear-tree of the Middle West is worthy of notice as an evidence of early interest in horticulture. This tree, known as the Ockletree pear, from the name of its owner, has acquired fame as the largest pear-tree of which there is record. The tree was a seedling brought from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1804, and was planted in an orchard at Vincennes, Indiana. It bore a number of record-breaking crops, the largest of which was 140 bushels of pears borne in 1837. In 1855, the trunk measured ten and one-half feet in circumference at the smallest place below the limbs; the top was estimated to have a spread of 75 feet. The tree gained its great port and productiveness from spread of branch rather than height, which was estimated to be only 65 feet. The variety was unknown, but the fruit was said to be somewhat inferior in quality. This monarch of its species was struck by a tornado in 1867 which stripped off its branches and caused the death of the tree a few years later.