FILLING UP VACANCIES. 93 



Then crack the sides also gently, and deposit pot and all in 

 the hole at the proper depth. If not enough broken, the sides 

 of the pot may now be further detached, nay even partially 

 removed. Now fill up with earth to the top. Pieces of the 

 pot left in the hole will do no harm ; but it, the pot, must be 

 sufficiently broken at the bottom to allow of the free descent 

 of the tap-root, as also enough broken at the sides to allow of 

 the free spreading of the rootlets. 



If all this has been carefully done, so that the mould in 

 the pot shall not have been shaken free of the rootlets, the 

 seedling will not even know it has been transplanted. Its 

 growth will not be delayed for a day, instead of two or three 

 months ; and by the time the dry season comes, the tap-root 

 will have descended far enough to imbibe moisture. 



Another plan to effect the same object. Instead of pots, 

 use coarse bamboo open wicker-work baskets. The split 

 bamboo forming the said wicker-work about half an inch 

 wide, the interstices about one quarter of an inch square. 

 Let the diameter of the basket, be the same at top and bot- 

 tom, viz,, 9 inches ; the depth of the basket 10 inches. 



When the seedlings in the nursery are large enough to 

 enable you to select a good class of plant, transplant one into 

 each basket previously filled with soil. 1 This being done, when 

 the plants are very young, and there being then no difficulty 

 in taking them up with earth attached to their short tap-roots 

 and rootlets, they will scarcely be thrown back at all. Being 

 near water they can also be well tended. Put basket and all 

 into the vacant hole at the beginning of the rains, and fill up 

 as directed for the pots. The interstices will allow the feeding 

 rootlets to pass through, besides the basket rots quickly under 

 ground, so quickly, it cannot impede the plant. 



Seed is not sown at once in the baskets as in the pots, 

 because the baskets would not last so long. Even putting 



1 Mind again this be of the same nature as the garden soil. 



