HOW TO BUD AND GRAFT. 45 



first discovery of what, though so common, is one of the 

 most wonderful phenomena of nature. As to the Chinese, 

 the first Roman Catholic missionaries who ventured to pen- 

 etrate the then mysterious fastnesses of heathenism taught 

 them the art, and so readily did they take up the new idea 

 thus presented to them that very soon they excelled their 

 teachers, just as, at the present day, they surpass all other 

 nations in the practice of curious and unique modes of 

 grafting shoot upon shoot, stem upon stem, until ofttimes 

 six or eight, ten or twelve kinds of fruit (of the same nat- 

 ural family, of course) may be seen borne upon the same 

 tree, all flourishing, all strong and healthful. 



There is no one function of the horticulturist more im- 

 portant than this ; it accomplishes the propagation of par- 

 ticular varieties more surely and more speedily than is pos- 

 sible by seeds or cuttings or layers, and besides this, is 

 invaluable in hastening and increasing the fruitfulness of 

 fruit trees. Another thing, too, when a root is still vigor- 

 ous and healthy, but its stems and branches old and weak, 

 a graft or bud near or upon the thrifty root will, in a very 

 short time, replace the worn-out branches with a new, 

 strong healthy growth, into which all the strength of the 

 large root is thrown at once. The stock should always 

 have strong roots; about the graft or scion it does not 

 matter so much, though, of course, it is desirable that 

 it also should be of vigorous habit; but if it is not, a 

 healthy stock will impart to a weak but not diseased scion 

 a large portion of its own thrift and vigor. Grafting 

 should always be performed early in the spring, when the 

 sap is just beginning to circulate ; the grafts may be either 

 shoots of the current year's growth, or those of several 

 years back ; and herein is one of the most marked differ- 

 ences between grafting and budding, for with the latter the 

 scion must invariably be of the current season's growth, 



