42 FRUIT GARDEN. 



flowering and hardy blossoms are desirable characters. It 

 has been observed, that even after a seedling tree has com- 

 menced bearing, its fruit has a tendency to improve as the 

 tree itself acquires vigor, so that, if, in the first season, 

 there is any considerable promise, a great melioration may 

 be expected in succeeding years. 



The slowness with which seedlings reach the bearing 

 state has been the subject of complaint among horticultur- 

 ists, and indeed is the principal reason why this mode of 

 propagation has not been more frequently practiced. 

 According to Mr. Knight, the pear requires from twelve to 

 eighteen years to reach the age of puberty ; the apple from 

 five to twelve or thirteen years ; the plum or cherry four or 

 five ; the vine three or four ; the raspberry two years. 

 The peach he found to bear in two, three, or four years. 

 The period, however, must depend greatly on the soil, situ- 

 ation, and mode of culture. In the warm and highly- 

 manured garden of M. Van Moiis at Brussels (called 

 Pepiniore de la Fidelite, 1816), seedling pear-trees pro- 

 duced fruit in considerable quantities in the sixth and 

 seventh summers. The great means of accelerating the 

 epoch of bearing seems to be, to make the trees grow vigor- 

 ously when young. Crude manures are indeed to be 

 avoided ; but vegetable earth, and, above all, a liberal sup- 

 ply of rotted turf, are wholesome and excellent stimulants. 

 The seed-bed, and the ground on which the seedlings are 

 transplanted, should be extremely well worked and com- 

 minuted with the spade, and should not be too much ex- 

 posed to the parching rays of the sun and withering action 

 of the wind. Great care ought to be taken to prevent the 

 young plants from becoming stunted. In pruning, the 

 small twigs in the interior should be removed, so as to 

 relieve the tree from the bushy appearance which it is apt 



