338 DESCRIPTIVE LIST Of PLUMS. 



save the trouble of staking, or otherwise supporting their 

 trees, plant them too deep, and thus defeat the operations of 

 Nature. That this is a prevalent error, has been shown, 

 page 311 and 319 to 322, to which the reader is referred 

 for a more concise view of the subject. 



New varieties of the Plum are produced from seed; and 

 the old kinds are generally propagated by budding on 

 stocks of free-growing Plums, in preference to grafting 

 because Plum trees are very apt to gum wherever large 

 wounds are made in them. All the sorts produce their fruit 

 on small natural spurs rising at the ends and along the sides 

 of the bearing shoots of one, two, or three years' growth- 

 In most sorts, new fruit branches are two years old before 

 the spurs bear. The same branches and spurs continue 

 fruitful, in proportion to the time which they take to come 

 into bearing. 



After the formation of the head is begun, it takes from 

 two to six years before the different sorts come into bearing. 

 Standards must be allowed to expand in free growth, 

 occasionally pruning long ramblers and irregular cross 

 branches. In annual pruning, thin crowded parts , cut 

 away worn out bearers, and all decayed and cankery wood. 

 The Plum may be cultivated in small gardens, trained as 

 espaliers, or to a close fence, like the Apricot, &c. 



The tree is of further use than for its fruit as a dessert, 

 &c. the bark dyes yellow ; the wood is used by turners ; 

 and the dried fruit, or prune, is formed into electuaries and 

 gentle purgatives. Prunes were originally brought from 

 Damascus, whence their name. 



SELECT DESCRIPTIVE LIST OF PLUMS, 



APRICOT PLUM, Prune Alricote, Abricotec dc Tours. The fruit is 

 large, its form globular, depressed, divided by a deep sature ; whitish 

 yellow, but faint red next the sfcm, and covered with bloom; its flesh is 

 firm, juicy, sweet, musky and excellent ; it ripens in August and Sep- 

 tember. 



BINGHAM. A delicious clingstone plum, of large size and oval form ;, 

 skin bright yellow, spotted and blotched with red ; flesh yellow, rich- 

 and delicious ; ripening in September, 



