TEAINING OF STANDARDS. 49 



clothed with fine fruit. Where the situation is warm, 

 and the climate favorable, a few of such of the fin.er 

 pear-trees as have hardy blossoms should be planted 

 out in this form. Though they may fail to ripen their 

 fruit in some seasons, they will often add greatly to the 

 resources of the fruit-room, their produce being fre- 

 quently superior in flavor to the pears grown against 

 walls. 



Training. — Two functions belong to training — that, 

 namely, which modifies the form of the trees, and that 

 W'hich regulates the bearing -^Vood, and consequently 

 the supply of blossom. The latter, more accurately 

 termed pruning, being of a varied character, adapted 

 to the habits of the difi'erent kinds of fruit-trees, will 

 more properly fait to be considered when treating of the 

 peach, pear, plum, &:c. ; at present we shall make a few- 

 remarks on the former. The essential properties of 

 training are, that it should be simple, not requiring fre- 

 quent amputation of large branches ; that it should be 

 appropriate to the growth of the tree, and such as to 

 promote the production of fruit. The knife is the great 

 instrument in training, and vrhoever can wield it skil- 

 fully will have a perfect command over his trees: at- 

 the same time, it tnay be laid down as- a inaxim, that 

 it should be used with some degree of reserve, as no- 

 thing is more prejudicial to the health and fruitfulness 

 of all sorts of trees than severe and injudicious cut- 

 ting. 



Training of Standards. — Orchard-trees ai'e generally 

 worked in the nurseries with stems five or six feet high. 

 All that is ^necessary in pruning trees of this sort, is 

 merely to cut out thabranches which cross or press upon 

 one another. Bushy heads should be thinned out, and 



