116 On the Propagation of Fruit-trees by discission. 



ing vessels being cut off by the division of the back, whilt 

 that by the ligneous circles or ascending vessels, being 

 deeper seated, remains*. The same reasoning accounts for 

 fruit-trees producing a greater crop than usual, pn being 

 stripped of their leaves, most of the ascending juices being 

 thrown off by them in perspiration, or expended in their 

 nourishment, for we find that bleeding trees cease to give 

 out their juices after they have put forth their leaves f. 



I have observed that the roots from a branch under the 

 operation of abscission were uniformly much longer in 

 shooting into the rope when the. tree was in leaf, than the 

 contrary : hence, the spring season appears most proper for 

 performing that operation. 



It will seem singular that the Chinese entertain the same 

 opinion that Linnseus did, respecting the pith of trees being 

 essential to the formation of the seed. By cutting into the 

 trunk of the guava tree before it has produced, and making 

 a division in the pith, they have obtained fruit without seed. 



Reference to the Engraving, Plate III., Fig. 1, cfthe Chinese 

 Method of propagating Fruit-trees by Abscission. 



A. The tree on which the operation is performed. 



B. The straw rope wound in a ball round a branch of the 

 tree. 



C. The cocoa-nut shell or vessel, containing the water, 

 which gradually drops from thence on the ball below it. 



D. Another branch of the same tree from which the part 

 E roosted in the straw rope or ball, and now ready for plant- 

 ing out, has been separated. 



F. The vessel suspended from a branch above, and from 

 which the ball had been supplied with water. 



* The circumstances attending: the Chinese method of propagating fruit- 

 trees, appear a strong confirmation of Mr. Bonnet's opinion, that plants as 

 well as animals have a regular circulation of their fluids. 



f Marsden, in his History of Sumatra, pnge 119, savs, "The nativcF, 

 when thev would force a tree that is backward to produce fruit, strip it of 

 its leaves ; by which means the nutritive juices are reserved for that iniportanl 

 use, and the blossoms soon show themselves in abundance." 



XXI. De- 



