AV BRITISH GARDENS. 479 



Pruning. The winter pruning of the peach under glass should take 

 place immediately after the fall of the leaf. The young shoots on the 

 lower branches should be cut back so as to ensure that the trellis 

 may be furnished from the bottom with young wood. The shoots 

 on the upper or farther extended branches may be shortened back to 

 half or one-third of their lengths, according to their strength, provided 

 they have been well ripened, and are free from canker ; but if the tree 

 be at all diseased, they should be cut so far back as to get rid of the 

 cankered or mildewed parts. The riders need not be pruned so much 

 as the dwarfs, the object being rather to throw them into a bearing 

 state, than to cause them to push very strong shoots, which would not 

 be fruitful. If they make moderately strong shoots, and if these be 

 well ripened in autumn, a good crop may be expected on them next 

 year. "Unless peach-trees be very strong," Mr. Thompson observes, 

 " the shoots should be more or less shortened, according to the vigour 

 of the tree. If this be not attended to, it will be impossible to prevent 

 the bearing wood from becoming naked at the base. The setting and 

 stoning of fruit, situated at or near the extremity of a three-year-old 

 branch, which has perhaps only leaves on the part produced during the 

 last season, is, indeed, very precarious." 



The summer pruning consists in pinching off all foreright shoots as 

 they appear, and all such as are ill-placed, weakly, watery, or deformed, 

 leaving a leader to every shoot of last year, and retaining a plentiful 

 supply of good lateral shoots in all parts of the tree. If any blank is 

 to be filled up, some conveniently-placed strong shoot is shortened in a 

 very early stage of its growth to a few eyes, in order that it may 

 throw out laterals. All luxuriant shoots should be stopped as soon 

 as their tendency to over-luxuriance is observed, in order that the 

 sap, which would otherwise be wasted, may be forced into the ad- 

 joining shoots, or expended in forming two or three fruit-bearing 

 branches, or in nourishing the fruit. 



The Fruit is thinned before and after the Stoning Season. There 

 should be a preparatory thinning soon after the fruit is set, leaving of 

 course a sufficient number in case of imperfection that may only become 

 apparent at the period of stoning ; because most plants, especially such 

 as have overborne themselves, drop many fruit at that crisis. When 

 this is over, the thinning should be effected with great regularity, 

 leaving the fruit retained at proper distances three, four, or five on 

 strong shoots, two or three on middling, and one or two on the weaker 

 shoots, and never leaving more than one peach at the same eye. The 

 fruit* on weakly trees should be thinned more in proportion. 



The peach-border will be partly within the house, but chiefly on the 

 outside, where it may extend ten feet or twelve feet from the front 

 wall. The usual depth of the border in medium soils and situations is 

 from two to three feet. The bottom should be previously thoroughly 

 drained, and covered wich a stratum of gravel, broken bricks, or other 

 similar materials, to conduct away superfluous water. The best soil 

 is a fresh strong loam from an old pasture, mixed with a few fragments 

 of freestone. The part of the borders on the outside may be covered 



