Well, not to scoop Lee or anything, but I do have one of the authors of the
Rosaceae section of the Flora of North America right down the hall here.
He has some wonderful illustrations (Rohrer, et al., 1991. Amer. J. Bot.
78; 1617-1635; figs, 12-16) of wild pear and crabapple fruits that clearly
show a contiguous band of sclereids at least 1 mm thick immediately around
the seeds. This is surrounded by a thicker band of parenchyma (with fewer
nests of sclereids) for which we have probably selected as the sweet part
of the domesticated pear. Pretty clearly a protective function.
Wil
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