SECT. XT I. OF PRUNING. 14$ 



knife sharp, and mind the position of it \vhen cut- 

 ting. Cut close and sloping'behind the eye ; neither 

 so near as to injure it, nor so wide as to leave a 

 stub. 



Digging deep with a spade about borders some- 

 times injures the roots, and keeps them tco low in 

 the ground, when they should be encouraged to rtm 

 higher ; and as nothing but well consumed dung, or 

 other manure that drops freely, should be used about 

 fruit trees, it is a good way to dig, or stir the ground 

 carefully with an asparagus fork. Wounds and 

 bruises hurt roots, as much as branches, and 

 though cutting small roots asunder by a spade, 

 does good rather than harm, yet large ones may be 

 injured by this instrument. 



The extremities of a tree will not be in vigour 

 without a strict attention to the middle, that it have 

 no strong wood, growing erectly ; this rule must be 

 observed ; but when the sides of a tree are well ex- 

 tended, and full of healthy wood, then some shoots 

 of moderate substance may be trained up the middle. 



The bending of a branch much is a violence to be 

 avoided ; so that every shoot should be kept from 

 the first in the direction it is to grow. 



Luxuriant wood must be particularly attended to, 

 to get rid of it in time, before it has robbed the 

 weaker branches too much. Tliat is luxuriant wood, 

 which, according to the general habit of the tree, is 

 much larger than the rest ; for a shoot that is deemed 

 luxuriant in one tree, may not be so in another. If 

 strong wood, that is not very, luxuriant, happens to 

 be at the bottom of the tree, so that it can be trained 

 quite horizontally, it may often be used to good pur- 

 pose, as this position checks the sap. A luxuriant 

 -shoot may be kept in summer where it is not de- 

 signed to retain it, merely to cut it down at winter 

 pruning to two or three eyes, for getting wood where 



