xxxviii INTRODUCTION 



Browne's " Observations on Grafting," probably 

 written at Evelyn's request for inclusion in his 

 " Elysium Brittannicum," have interest as showing the 

 position which Botanical Science had attained in the 

 seventeenth century on the "doctrine of insitions " 

 in regard not only to " hortensial plants," but 

 to all sorts of shrubs and trees, " whereby we might 

 alter their tempers, moderate or promote their virtues, 

 exchange their softness, hardness and colour, and so 

 render them considerably beyond their known and 

 trite employments." It may be interesting to some of 

 my readers to compare Bacon's observations on graft- 

 ing with those of Browne, so I transcribe the follow- 

 ing passages from the great philosopher's " Sylva 

 Sylvarum," only premising that Bacon conveyed 

 some of his botanical experiences, without acknowledg- 

 ment, from the pages of Baptista Porta's "Natural 

 Magick " : 



There is no doubt but that grafting (for the most part), 

 doth meliorate the fruit. The cause is manifest ; for that 

 the nourishment is better prepared in the stock than in the 

 crude earth ; but yet note well that there are some trees that 

 are said to come up more happily from the kernel than from 

 the graft ; as the peach and the melocotone. . . . 



It hath been received, that a smaller pear grafted upon a 

 stock that beareth a greater pear, will become great. But 

 I think it is as true as that of the prime fruit upon the late 

 stock, and e converso, which we rejected before ; for the 



