28 , FRUIT-BEARING POWERS 



then take a common sickle, and chop away at a vine 

 right and left, and if he chance to leave any young 

 wood at all remaining, that wood will produce fruit, 

 because nearly every bud formed in such a summer 

 becomes a fruit-bud. In the following year, almost 

 every vine, however injudiciously managed, will be 

 seen loaded with fruit, and the year is then called "a 

 grape year." In such years I have frequently seen 

 vines, groaning as it were beneath their prodigious 

 number of bimches, and have on sach occasions inva- 

 riably pointed out to the owners of them, the cer- 

 tainty of the plants being crippled for many years to 

 come, if the whole quantity produced were suifered 

 to remain and ripen ; but no representation of this 

 sort made by me to any one, whether gardener or 

 otherwise, ever had, in any instance, the effect of 

 causing the excess in the quantity to be reduced, even 

 by a single bunch. So deeply rooted seems to be the 

 belief, that because a vine shotvs a greater number of 

 bunches of grapes, it can, therefore, ripen them. 



Many years ago 1 was led to consider the necessity 

 of ascertaining the extent of the fruit-bearing powers 

 of vines, in order to insure their successful culture, 

 by founding thereon a system of pruning, which 

 should be simple in practice, and certain in its effects; 

 being based on the principle of proportioning the 

 quantity of bearing-wood retained at the autumnal 

 pruning, to the capability of their powers of matura- 

 tion. For the attainment of that object, therefore, I 

 commenced a series of experiments on a great num- 

 ber of vines of various ages and sorts, and trained on 

 every variety of aspect, south of, and includmg the 

 eastern and western points of the horizon. 



Knowing by previous experience, that it was possi- 

 ble to load a vine with such a quantity of fruit, as 

 would completely deprive it of life in its endeavors 

 to mature it, and assuming that the circumference of 

 the stem of the plant would form a true index to its 

 vital powers, unless these had been injured by over- 



