86 THE FLORIST. 



resulted in the fruit of the trees ripening three weeks sooner ; in that 

 season, the wood became well ripened, and the moss disappeared. 



During some years after drainage, test holes were made in the drained 

 and undrained soils, and the temperature of these was accurately noted. 

 The results of these observations w^ere most interesting ; but although 

 the records are in ]\Ir. Johnson's possession, he does not feel at liberty 

 to give them to the public (and this with a sensitive dehcacy which does 

 him honour), as the experiments were made at the expense of Mr, 

 Parkes, who we hope will, at some future opportunity, make them 

 public. 



The test holes in drained soil indicated no water within four feet of 

 the surface, while in the undrained land the water was only one foot 

 below it. " Many persons," says Mr. Johnson, " who visited me were 

 sceptical as to the ailvantage of deep draining, but after examining the 

 test holes, invariably went away converts to the deep system." 



Mr. Johnson says, " 1 saved a good crop of fruit this season, which, 

 without covering, I should not have done." This I fully believe, and 

 it is only consonant with the experience and practice of a host of our 

 best gardeners, who have arrived at the same conclusion. Mr. 

 Spencer, of Bowood, uses broad, projecting coping boards, and makes 

 breaks in his walls, to shelter his trees from the cold, cutting easterly 

 winds ; Mr. Fleming, of Trentham, has covered nearly all his walls 

 with glass ; Mr. Ingram, of Windsor, uses screens to his trees ; so also 

 Mr. Tillyard, the clever gardener of the Speaker of the House of 

 Commons; and all succeed, not biennially, but always since they 

 adopted them. 



Many of the readers of the Florist have, I make no doubt, been 

 startled by the communications of Mr. Saul and his favourite theory of 

 thinning the spurs to give the flowers more " protecting properties," (as 

 Sir H. Stewart would call them), and by this means to ensure crops of 

 fruit in alternate years. Mr. Saul very justly condemns allowing fruit 

 trees to be overcropped, and says that the result of excessive bearing is 

 generally shown in a deficient crop the following year. He is correct 

 to a certain extent, but in this county I can adduce many instances of 

 trees in the villages known as the " Apricot villages," where trees have 

 not failed in bearing heavy crops for many years running, and which 

 have scarcely ever been touched by a knife since they were in the 

 nursery. I can point out to Mr. Saul not only one, two, three, or four 

 instances, but can prove the truth of my assertion in hundreds of them. 

 I think that as regards the Apricot, we gardeners are too fond of the 

 knife, and not unfrequently for appearance sake we remove the fruc- 

 tiferous growths but to replace them with rank, overgrown wood. It 

 is well to occasionally shorten back and thin the old spurs ; and who, 

 worthy the name of gardener, does not do it ? Why is it that we 

 almost always see the apparently ill cared for and ill trained trees of the 

 •cottagers producing fine crops of fruit, and generally much overcropped. 

 It is in my opinion for the reasons I am about to give. 



There can be no doubt that the more massively a wall is built, or 

 the thicker it is, even if hollow, the longer it will be in radiating at 

 night the heat it has accumulated during the day. The walls of the 



