1873.] STONE FRUITS AND HARD SOIL. 375 



it will soon break into fresh growth with two or three shoots, which, 

 as they make a few joints of growth, should be stopped in their turn, 

 to break again with an increased number of leaders. They will be 

 ready for a shift by midsummer at the latest. Those that are strong 

 and growing freely will require 5-inch pots. Use the same compost 

 already recommended, but with more of the fibry part of the peat in it, 

 and by autumn they will make nice bushy plants. These, the follow- 

 ing season, can be grown, with two shifts, into comparatively large 

 plants. 



This system is so simple that a thousand a-day might be operated 

 on by two experts ; and we have found it so certain that it rarely ever 

 fails, whereas grafting with the wood of the stock and graft in a hard- 

 ripened condition is less certain and far more tedious in uniting. The 

 young growing wood makes so perfect a union that in a year or two 

 it cannot be easily detected. When standard plants are wanted it is 

 best to grow on the stocks to the desired height before grafting, as 

 they will attain it more quickly than if grafted and the graft allowed 

 to grow single stemmed to the desired height. 



STONE FRUITS AND HARD SOIL. 



It has often occurred to me, w^hile observing the fruit trees growing 

 on the walls of houses in many of the villages throughout England, 

 especially in the southern districts, that the firmness of the soil has 

 much to do with the longevity, hardiness, and fruitfulness of these 

 trees, which are generally loaded with fruit of very fair quality. There 

 is little attention given in the way of cultivation ; all the training they 

 get is a cut here and there to prevent the young branches from pull- 

 ing the old ones from their fastening. They must have grown apace 

 at some period, as large breadths of mason-work are covered with single 

 trees, such as are not met with in many gardens. In this locality (Oxford) 

 Apricots have been famous for many years, and great crops have been 

 gathered ; and the industrious villagers have often been able to pay 

 their rents from the old trees on the ends of their houses. It has ap- 

 peared to me in most cases that these veterans have been planted with 

 very little care — probably a hole has been made, enough to twist the 

 roots into, and the soil replaced over them, and rammed down as if to 

 form part of a floor. The hard-trodden gravel (in many cases cause- 

 way and pavement) would lead one to suppose that moisture could 

 never reach the fibres, but I suppose the fibres must travel to the 

 moisture ; a wide street is generally the space where the border should 

 be. Other trees have the usual outhouses standing over the space 



