128 TREATISE ON THE 



ting, that it cannot without difficulty be drawn 

 out by the hand ; others fill the hole in which 

 the slip is planted, with dust or finely pulverized 

 earth. 



After different experiments of all these methods, 

 I find that the cuttings planted in trenches usually 

 succeed. But this manner is tedious, as well as la- 

 borious, if, in the planting, the necessary order and 

 regularity be preserved. Another inconvenience 

 attending this method, is the difficulty of the lay- 

 ing of the young plants, where this operation 

 becomes from circumstances advisable. I admit 

 the preference due to the method of planting 

 with the plantoir, if attended with the necessary 

 precautions. Planting the rooted vines is, in 

 my opinion, the worst possible method, unless it 

 be in a soil in which the cuttings vegetate with 

 difficulty. It is true that the rooted plant takes 

 more easily to the soil, than the cutting, but in 

 my experience such plants are sooner exhausted, 

 acquiring, even more slowly than the cuttings, 

 their ultimate size and maturity. If the cutting 

 be not planted the proper or sufficient depth, it 

 is liable to injury from the operations of the 

 spade or hoe, and also from the drought of a hot 

 season. If, on the contrary, the planting be too 

 deep, success may be doubtful, the sun having 

 but little power to warm the roots of the plant, 

 except in seasons remarkably hot and dry, and 

 whereas, should the first summer prove at all 

 moist or rainy, but little hope can be entertained 

 of a successful vegetation. From my own ex- 

 perience I should say, that in level ground, by 

 the which I mean, in a vineyard, the site of 



