42 TRANSPLANTING. 
It is a great point, in all cases of transplanting, to preserve the 
epidermis or cellular integument of the fibrous roots and spongioles 
in a flexible state ; and for this reason, the greatest care is taken to 
keep them moist. This is the end in view in puddling or fixing by 
water in transplanting; and many planters always dip the roots of 
trees and shrubs in water before replanting. When a tree or shrub 
is taken up that is to be conveyed any distance, the roots should be 
wrapped up as soon as it is taken out of the ground, in wet moss, 
and covered with bast matting; and where moss cannot be procured, 
they should be dipped in very wet mud, and then matted up. Cab- 
bage-plants are frequently preserved in this manner; and are con- 
veyed, without any other covering to their roots than a cake of mud, 
to a considerable distance. In all cases where plants are taken up 
long before they are replanted, their roots should be kept moist by 
opening a trench, and laying the plants along it, and then covering 
their roots with earth. This gardeners call laying plants in by the 
heels. Where this cannot be done, and the plants are kept long out 
of the ground, their roots should be examined, and moistened from 
time to time; and before replanting they should be laid in water for 
some hours, and afterwards carefully examined, and the withered 
and decayed parts cut off. 
In removing large trees, care is taken to prepare the roots by cutting 
a trench round the tree for a year or two before removal, and pruning 
off all the roots that project into it. This is to answer the same pur- 
pose as transplanting young trees in a nursery ; while the bad effects 
of eontracting the range of the roots is counteracted, by filling the 
trench with rich fresh earth. The removal is also conducted with 
much care; and either a large ball of earth is removed with the tree, 
or the roots are kept moist, and spread out carefully at full length, 
when the tree is replanted. Some planters, before removing trees, 
mark which side stood to the south, in order to replant them with the 
same side turned towards the sun; and this is sometimes done with 
young trees from a nursery. The reason is, that the tree having 
generally largest branches, and being always most flourishing, on the 
side exposed to the sun, it is thought that its vegetation might be 
checked, were a different side presented to that luminary, by the ef- 
forts it must make to accommodate itself to its new situation. On 
the other hand, however, it may be urged that changing the position 
of the plant, particularly while it is young, will be beneficial in pre- 
