GLEANINGS FROM OLD WRITERS. 61 



prest down, will cover it the thickness of half-a-crown, then water 

 it well with a fine rose watering pot. 



" Cover the pots with nets to keep the birds from the seed, for, 

 small as it is, they will have it if possible, and this being done, set 

 the pans under a wall exposed to an east aspect till June is past, 

 and then set them under a north wall, for they love shade. 



" When these plants have two or three leaves a piece, they may 

 be transplanted in a bed of fine earth of the sort before-mentioned, 

 but it must be done by a very careful hand, for the roots being 

 very small, should not be bruised by any means ; and then if the 

 plants are not replanted as soon as they are taken up, the fibres 

 will be endangered of drying by the air, and then the plant runs 

 the hazard of being lost. 



"When you transplant these seedlings, set them six inches 

 distance, and water them well, and shade them for a week or ten 

 days. 



" From one hundred of such seedling plants I raised above 

 twenty sorts, different from what I had before." 



The following remarks, (from the same Author, Cowell,) may 

 be of use even to your Floricultural Friends at this period, though 

 not coming exactly under the title, but in lit^e fancy gardens 

 about London I have no doubt it will be acceptable : — 



" My particular observations of vines amount to this extra- 

 ordinary direction : — That if we have vines in espaliers, or against 

 walls, we must always expect the young wood to bear fruit, for 

 'tis from the young wood only that we have shoots that bear grapes. 

 I mean by the shoots which we ought to preserve, such as have 

 shot last summer, and of those in an irregular vine, save the 

 strongest in which you will see two sorts of buds and joints. In 

 one sort, the buds will lie pretty near one another, and in the 

 other, for three or four joints beyond them, the buds will be set 

 at long distances, and these last will not bear fruit till the second 

 }*ear ; beyond these again, we find the joints shorter for three or 

 four buds, which buds will bear fruit the same year. 



" In the common pruning of these shoots, they ought to be 



left long, in proportion to their thickness ; but be sure to leave so 



much of each shoot upon the tree as has its joints short, and the 



buds full, which will be about four or five." 



Tuli*a, 



