THE FRENCH SYSTEM OF PRUNING. 271 



remarkable specimens exhibited at the Agricultural 

 Show of Paris in 1861, and at the Universal Exposi- 

 tion of London in 1862, that it is beneficial and often 

 indispensable to prune the oldest trees, if care and 

 judgment are used in the operation. He has clearly 

 shown, too, that trunks so treated attained a larger 

 size and a greater value in a given time than those 

 which, under similar conditions of growth, had been 

 allowed to retain all their badly-placed branches. 



" Each amputation of a branch produces a cavity, 

 and the tree soon becomes entirely decayed. In view 

 of such destruction, it might seem, perhaps, that 

 branches of a certain diameter cannot be safely am- 

 putated. That this is an erroneous idea will be easily 

 seen ; and it is only necessary to make the amputation 

 even with the trunk, and then cover the wound with 

 coal-tar, to avoid all bad results. Although wounds 

 caused by the amputation of small branches heal over 

 in spite of the faulty methods of pruning generally 

 employed, such operations are, nevertheless, attended 

 with considerable danger to the tree. 



" If it can be proved that the number of timber 

 trees may be doubled in a plantation by good manage- 

 ment, and that the value of individual trees scattered 

 through the fields and along the roadsides may be 

 wonderfully increased, it is easy to understand that a 

 landowner may greatly benefit himself, and add to the 

 wealth of his country, by adopting such methods. 



" That pruning can accomplish the results which 

 are claimed for it, is found in the fact that trees 

 treated by the rational system proposed grow more 

 vigorously, and retain their foliage longer than un- 

 pruned trees in the same locality grown under similar 

 conditions. 



