254 AROUND AN OLD HOMESTEAD. 



polished, and highly prized. Ox yokes were sometimes 

 made from the limbs. There is something very de- 

 lightful in pruning. It is not hard labor, and it is 

 always interesting to see the shape of a tree improve 

 by our own trimming. In the spring we shall watch 

 with solicitude to see whether the prospects for fruit 

 are the better for it. Yes, we think the trees will blow 

 well, so much was taken off that was useless; and, when 

 at last almost every twig is pink, and the season turns 

 out a good one, and the ripening spheres in autumn 

 rouse our just pride, we say it pays to take care of the 

 orchard. It is quite an art to dress trees well; for 

 each variety has its own preferences of shape and ways 

 of growing, and these must be studied in order to clean 

 the tree to advantage, and so to produce the best crop. 

 Yet every one can learn it, and it is a pleasure to do 

 so. Nature will not take care of them very well for 

 us. She expects aid at our hands, with our shears and 

 knives and saws; and, unless we give it, she will forth- 

 with cause such sprouts and tanglegrowth to spring up 

 that it will be impossible for us to make much head- 

 way unless we clear them aside; and then, even after 

 that, if we do not, she will either abandon the race 

 and the tree will die, or she will bring a new tree from 

 the old. 



Apples attain to their best color when the orchard 

 is on a hillside with a northern exposure. Then they 

 paint themselves with the most delicate tints and the 

 most gorgeous hues that the brush of autumn can 

 splash upon them. Stained with their native yellow, 

 they are yet often striped with some of the many vari- 

 ations of red, or even dashed with a shade of purple. 



