142 TREATISE ON THE 



ftil vigor, as without an attention to this import- 

 ant point, the crust formed on the wounded sur- 

 face, will be so near the button, as greatly to 

 injure the vegetation of it, causing it to push 

 with difficulty, and sometimes destroying alto- 

 gether the principle of vegetation. 



If even the latter should not take place, the 

 wood will not ripen well, and the fruit will be 

 inferior and less abundant. Late pruning is at- 

 tended with a heavy flow of sap, which greatly 

 exhausts the vine, and frequently shortens the 

 life of the plant. It has been remarked, that 

 when a severe frost has immediately succeeded 

 the first pushing of the bud, those vines that 

 have been pruned late in the season, have been 

 found to suffer least, being the least advanced in 

 vegetation, then again, that sometimes the vines 

 under a late pruning produce that season a larger 

 crop of fruit than many others. But these cir- 

 cumstances, which cannot be attributed to any 

 but an accidental coincidence, should not influ- 

 ence us to abandon the system of early pruning. 

 Many intelligent proprietors of our Canton, par- 

 ticularly those who have given to the cultivation 

 of the vine an attention the most enlightened, 

 having observed that the chances of frost are fre- 

 quent and injurious to their vines, have adopted 

 the opposite method of late pruning and digging, 

 and notwithstanding that this measure is always 

 attended by a heavy flow of sap, they contend 

 that the loss thus sustained, is less prejudicial to 

 their vines than the injury resulting from our 

 heavy late frosts. Such is not my opinion. I 



