EENOVATION OF SUBURBAN GARDENS. 153 



and rendering the ground damp and unproductive, and the atmosphere 

 unhealthy. The fruit trees will generally be cankered, and producing little 

 or no fruit ; and the little which they do produce will have a bad flavour. 

 The fruit shrubs, such as the gooseberry, the currant, and the raspberry, will 

 be found overgrown, and crowded together for want of pruning and thinning. 

 The onlj' effectual remedy for these evils is, to root out the whole of the 

 ligneous plants, and to introduce young healthy plants in their stead. There 

 •need be the less regret at doing this, because the kinds of fruit trees and 

 shrubs, and of ornamental trees and shrubs, that were planted in suburban 

 gardens twenty years ago, were very inferior to those which may now be 

 purchased in the nurseries. There is another reason why it will almost 

 always become necessary to root out the fruit trees in an old garden ; which 

 is, that their roots will, in most cases, be found too deeply buried in the soil. 

 The main cause of this is, that they have been planted too deep at first ; that 

 is, the soil having been trenched perhaps 2 or 3 feet deep, pi'eviously to 

 planting, the trees have been planted just as deep as they would have been 

 on solid ground ; in consequence of which, and of the watering and treading 

 down the soil to the roots at the time of planting, the collar of the tree is, the 

 very first year, 2 or 3 inches below the surface; and every year afterwards, 

 from the additions made to the soil by manure, and from its swelling up in 

 consequence of the pulverisation it receives by culture, the root of the ti-ee 

 becomes still more and more deeply buried, till, at the end of 20 years, the 

 collar is perhaps 6 or 8 inches deeper in the soil than it ought to be. This 

 burying of the collar is the grand cause of the unfruitfulness of fruit trees in 

 small gardens ; and, indeed, it is not too much to say in all gardens whatever ; 

 and this deep burying of the roots is just as hurtful to a gooseberry, a currant, 

 or a raspberry, as it is to an apple, a pear, or a plum. In the case of flowering 

 trees and shrubs it is equally injurious, by preventing them from flowering. 

 If, therefore, old trees and shrubs of any kind are to be retained in reno- 

 vating the garden, they will require to be taken up, and replanted with their 

 collars rather above the surface than under it, so as to allow for the sinking of 

 the ground, and to cause the tree, even when the ground is thoroughly 

 settled, to have the appearance of growing out of a small mound. If we 



examine thriving trees in a 



state of natm-e, we shall always 



find that the collar (that is, the 



point of junction between the 68 



stem and the root) rises above 



the general surface, as shown _ 



in Jig. 67. On the other hand, 



if we examine trees that have been planted by man in 

 deeply trenched soils, we shall generally find that, though planted at first as 

 shown in Jiy. 68., they will, after a certain number of years, have sunk, as 

 shown in Jig. 69. ; or, if care has been taken to keep the ground about them 



level by adding fresh 

 69 J I soil as it sinks, they will 



\| appear, as in Jiff. 70., 



with their collars com- 

 pletely buried, and their - 

 trunks rising out of the 



