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more comely and beautiful, by a proper and 

 seasonable pruning. 



1st. Heading-in. Trees are headed back, 

 in order to restore a balance of power between 

 the root and the top. We have already ex- 

 plained this in the Chapter on Transplanting. 

 Feeble trees of all sizes are benefitted by this 

 treatment. When a large tree is to be grafted 

 over, it may be headed back, if you choose, a 

 year or two previously, and the scions or buds 

 may be inserted into the young, thrifty shoots 

 that will be emitted from the ends of the limbs 

 where they were sawed off. By judicious 

 grafting and pruning of these, a new, hand- 

 some, and very valuable top may be put upon 

 an old and apparently worthless tree: but you 

 must not forget to dig and enrich the soil 

 around its roots, at the same time. Young 

 trees, two or three years from the seed, or one 

 year from the graft, are not unfrequently head- 

 ed down to two or three buds, on purpose to 

 strengthen their growth. A single bud is then 

 trained vertically, and the rest pruned away 

 in the course of the summer. In such cases, 

 the growth of the top being attended with a 

 corresponding increase of fibrous roots, the 

 tree at once becomes vigorous and healthy. 



