No. 85.J 297 



cut faces ; and good grafting-wax snugly applied. The wax may be 

 spread thickly on muslin or paper, and warmed slightly with a chaf- 

 ing-dish before applying ; or, it may be worked in cold water, by 

 constantly drawing it out, until it may be drawn into thin ribbons, 

 which are wrapped round the place of junction. A good grafting- 

 wax is made of one part by weight of beeswax, two of tallow, and 

 four of rosin. When spread on paper, it may be very expeditiously 

 done with a brush, while melted, over the whole sheet, which is after- 

 wards cut up on a cold day by a knife, 



Apple trees for removal from the nursery should be at least two 

 years' growth from the graft or bud, and six or seven feet high. They 

 should not be much larger than this size, if stunting by removal 

 would be avoided • unless prepared for the operation by previous 

 transplanting, and a consequent occasional shortening cf the long 

 roots, once or twice before. 



Propagation by cuttings, suckers, and layers, is rarely practiced. 

 From cuttings^ trees can only be successfully raised by very skillful 

 treatment, under glass ; they are sometimes thus raised in England -, 

 but in our dryer and hotter climate, it must prove very difficult, and 

 certainly of no value in practice. Insertion of the cutting into a po 

 tatoe, and various other modes, are heralded every few years through 

 the newspapers, but always ultimately prove failures on trial. It may 

 therefore be laid down as settled, for all useful purposes, that a cut- 

 ting or graft will not grow unless inserted into a stock, or a portion 

 of the root of the apple. 



Propagation by suckers can only be done to advantage from a 

 seedling tree, whose suckers are, of course, unlike those of a graft- 

 ed tree, identical with the top. 



The apple is easily propagated by layers^ for which purpose the 

 grafted tree to operate from, should be planted in an inclined or 

 drooping position, that its branches may be easily buried beneath the 

 earth. These will root in one season, and may be cut off and set out 

 in rows the following spring. This mode of manufacturing trees, 

 though little attended to, has, in some cases, proved very advantage- 

 ous and convenient ', and the suckers from the trees thus produced, 

 are the same as the rest of the tree, and are genuine without budding 

 or grafting. 



