103 PROFITABLE FRUIT-GROWING. 



manure for fruit trees may adopt the formula of 

 Mr. Edmund Tonks, for Apples, though it is good 

 for other kinds superphosphate of lime, twelve 

 parts (or pounds) ; nitrate of potash, ten ; chloride 

 of soda, four ; sulphate of magnesia, two ; sulphate 

 of iron, one ; and sulphate of lime, eight mix and 

 apply at the rate of a quarter of a pound to the 

 square yard to trees that do not make satisfactory 

 growth. Liquid manure of any kind, applied in 

 summer or winter, is of great benefit to weakly 

 trees. 



Grafting Trees. This is one of the oldest arts 

 in gardening, also one of the most simple and use- 

 ful, yet a great number of persons who are inter- 

 ested in fruit-culture are necessarily unacquainted 

 with the process of converting a Crab into an Apple, 

 a Quince into a Pear, or making a tree that bears 

 bad Apples or Pears produce good ones by putting 

 on new heads. The first conditions for success are 

 that the cut-down trees, termed stocks, are healthy ; 

 and the portions to be added, which are called 

 grafts, or scions, must be of firm, clean, young wood, 

 not soft succulent shoots. 



These grafts or scions should be taken off in 

 winter before the buds start into growth, and be 

 laid in damp soil in a cool, shaded place to keep 

 them back until the sap in the stocks has com- 



