A M Y 



AMY 



year young dwarfs should be planted where the 

 riders stood, and the old dwarfs be converted 

 into riders by degrees as the young ones ad- 

 vance." 



For the constant certain production of this 

 fruit, flued walls are indispensably necessary ; 

 and where a fine garden is forming, the extra ex- 

 pense in flueing two or three hundred feet of the 

 best exposed wall is but trifling, as, if built on a 

 good plan, and wrought in a judicious manner, 

 the annual expense will not be any great affair. 



The methods of protecting the blossom until 

 the fruit be set has been explained already ; we 

 may therefore proceed to the business of apply- 

 ing the heat. 



.But before this is done a trellis, or spars of 

 an inch square, should be fixed against the walls 

 to the height of the first course of the flue, in or- 

 der to keep the young shoots from being scorched 

 or injured by the fire; as when it has reached the 

 second flue, the trees may lie against the wall 

 without danger of being hurt. 



It is the custom of some, to apply fire heat to 

 flued walls in the spring season ; but this Mr. 

 Nicol disapproves of, as no species of forcing is 

 so intricate ; the trees being placed between the 

 extremes of heat and cold, it is quite impossible to 

 make or regulate a climate for them. In his 

 opinion, " all that is necessary for the produc- 

 tion of a crop, is, ripening and hardening the 

 wood in autumn, and screening from frosty and 

 boisterous winds in spring." 



When the buds begin to appear turgid in the 

 spring, he advises screens to be hung up : and, 

 " if canvass, letdown in the day, from eight in 

 the morning to live or six in the afternoon, in 

 mild weather ; but if boisterous frosty winds pre- 

 vail, to continue them all day ; and they should 

 not be totally removed till about the middle of 

 June; by which time the fruit will be fairly set, 

 and all danger past. About the first or middle 

 of August, according to the season and forward- 

 ness of the fruit and wood, the fires may be lighted. 

 These must be made very moderate at first, and in- 

 creased as the season advances. If the surface of 

 the wall about the second course of the flue be 

 kept milk warm in the night, it is, he thinks, all 

 that is necessary ;" and the quantity of fuel must 

 not be enlarged in a stormy night in this case in 

 the same degree as in a hot-house ; as by that 

 means all would be ruined ; for the intention in 

 the application of fire, in this instance, is not the 

 forming a climate for the trees, but the ripening 

 the young shoots for the production of fruit in 

 the following season. 



The nectarine admits of being forced in the 

 same manner. 



In the dwarf and double-blossomed kinds of 

 Peach-trees the propagation is accomplished by 



budding them on stocks of the same sort as those 

 of the peach-tree. 



These are principally cultivated for the purpose 

 of ornament, as when planted in the borders of 

 shrubberies, or other places, they are curious, 

 and produce a fine effect early in the season. The 

 dwarf sort is sometimes planted in pots, and 

 when exposed with the fruit upon it lias a 

 striking appearance, 



The common peach-tree may likewise be 

 placed as a standard in sheltered situations in 

 pleasure grounds, as it has a fine appearance 

 when in full blow. 



Culture in the Nectarine Kind. — In the propa- 

 gation, culture, and management of this tree, 

 the same attention will be necessary as in the 

 peach. In this case it is, however, better to take 

 the buds from old bearing trees, and not from 

 young ones as is commonly the case. And in the 

 pruning, particular care should be taken not to 

 lay in the wood too thick or close. 



Mr. Forsyth observes, that "on account of the 

 smoothness of the skin, the nectarine suffers 

 much more from millepeds or wood-lice, ear- 

 wigs, &c. than the peach : it will therefore be 

 necessarv to hang up a greater number of bundles 

 of bean-stalks about these than about other fruit- 

 trees. Wasps are also very destructive to Necta- 

 rines, and the trees arc very liable to be infested 

 with the red spider." He advises, the walls with 

 the stems and branches of the trees to be care- 

 fully inspected, and all the snails about them 

 picked off and destroyed, as young snails fre- 

 quently commit great depredations on the leaves 

 before the fruit is fully ripe. 



After the fall of the leaf the young shoots 

 should, he says, be unnailed, in order to harden 

 the wood ; and in hot weather, basins formed on 

 the borders, and mulched as for peaches. And 

 watering with the engine is also to be practised 

 in dry hot weather in the same manner. 



The fruit should be thinned when grown to a 

 tolerable size, but the leaves never picked off till 

 the fruit be fully grown. 



AMYKIS, a genus comprehending different 

 balsamiferous shrubs, of the sweet-wood kind, 

 and which are tender exotics for the stove. 



It belongs to the class and order Octandria 

 Monogyma, and ranks in the natural order of 

 Terebintacece. 



The characters of which are, that the calyx is 

 a one-leafed, four-toothed, acute, erect, small 

 and permanent perianthium ; the corolla consists 

 of four oblong, concave, and spreading petals ; 

 the stamina have awl-shaped, cicct filaments j 

 the anthers, oblong, erect, of the length of the 

 corolla ; the pistillum has a germ, superior, 

 ovate ; the style thickish, of the length of the 

 stamens ; and the stigma is four-cornered ; the 



