JAN.] THE NURSERY. 69 



they have taken good root ; also occasionally to new-layed layers, 

 and newly planted cuttings in dry warm weather; but as to hardy 

 trees and shrubs of all sorts, if planted out at the proper time, that 

 is, not too late in spring, no great regard need be paid to watering, 

 for they will generally succeed very well without any; indeed, where 

 there are but a few, you may, if you please, water them occasionally, 

 if it proves a very dry spring in April and May ; but where there 

 are great plantations, it would be an almost insupportable fatigue, 

 and a great expense. 



Every winter or spring the ground between the rows of all sorts 

 of transplanted plants in the open nursery quarters must be digged; 

 this is particularly necessary to all the tree and shrub kinds that 

 stand wide enough in rows to admit the spade between; which work 

 is by the nurserymen called turning-in ; the most general season for 

 this Work is any time from October to the latter end of March; but 

 the sooner it is done the more advantageous it will prove to the 

 plants. The ground is to be digged one spade deep, proceeding row 

 by row, turning the top of each pit clean to the bottom, that all 

 weeds on the top may be buried a proper depth to rot : this work of 

 turning-in is a most necessary annual operation, both to destroy 

 weeds and to increase the growth of the young nursery plants. 



In summer be remarkably attentive to keep all sorts clean from 

 weeds; the seedlings growing close in the seminary beds must be 

 hand-weeded; but among plants of all sorts that grow in rows wide 

 enough to introduce a hoe, this will prove not only the most expe- 

 ditious method of destroying weeds, but by loosening the top of the 

 soil it will prove good culture in promoting the growth of all kinds 

 of plants ; always perform this work of hoeing in dry weather in due 

 time, before the weeds grow large, and you may soon go over a great 

 space of ground, either with a common drawing hoe, or occasionally 

 with a scuffling hoe, as you shall find the most convenient. 



According as any quarters or compartments of the nursery ground 

 are cleared from plants, others must be substituted in their room 

 from the seminary, &c., but the ground should previously be trenched 

 and lie some time fallow to recruit or recover its former vigor ; giving 

 it also the addition of manure, if it shall seem proper; and after 

 being trenched in ridges, and having the repose only of one winter 

 or summer, or a year at most, it will sufficiently recover its vegeta- 

 tive force, and may be planted fresh. 



It will be of advantage to plant the grounds with plants of a dif- 

 ferent kind from those which it occupied before. 



The tender or exotic plants of all kinds that require shelter only 

 from frost, whilst young, as formerly mentioned, and by degrees be- 

 come hardy enough to live in the open air ; should such of them as 

 are seedlings in the open ground have the beds arched over with 

 hoops or rods at the approach of winter, in order to be sheltered with 

 mats in severe weather; and those which are in pots, either seedlings 

 or transplanted plants, should be removed in October in their pots 

 to a warm sunny situation sheltered with hedges, &c., placing some 

 close under the fences facing the sun, where they may have occa- 

 sional covering with mats in frosty weather ; others that are more 



