FRUITS, VEGETABLES, AND FLOWERS. II 



duction of fine fruit, all others being removed. Thus in some 

 plants the cultivator favours leafy or vegetative growth, while 

 in others sexual vigour is also requisite, and this is especially 

 the case in all our fruit-bearing trees ; and here the aim of the 

 hybridiser is to produce fertile varieties that is, varieties in 

 which sexual vigour and vegetative growth are pretty equally 

 balanced. In some cases, however, where the vegetative growth 

 is much in excess of sexual vigour, it is balanced by root-prun- 

 ing or by summer pinching, or by grafting on stocks which 

 restrict the vegetative growth, as when we work strong-growing 

 Pears on the Quince, or Apples on the Paradise stock. In 

 cases where sexual vigour is in excess of the vegetative growth, 

 as when trees are half starved on poor soils, we adopt different 

 measures, such as grafting on more vigorous-rooted varieties 

 as stock, or the application of manurial stimulants. The 

 whole question of culture is based on the fact that each plant 

 consists of diverse characteristics, some of which are antag- 

 onistic to others ; and by repressing those characteristics we 

 do not want, we give the others which we do require a better 

 chance of full development. Thus it will be seen that by 

 grafting and pruning we are able to adjust the balance between 

 vegetative growth and sexual vigour, and so make a tree more 

 fruitful than when on its own roots ; but then both pruning and 

 grafting are unnatural, and only tolerated because we have not 

 yet fully learnt the art of raising varieties suited to different soils 

 in which sexual and vegetative growth are naturally balanced : 

 and this leads us to a very important point, and illustrates 

 how, by a combination of grafting and seminal reproduction or 

 hybridism, we may hope to work great improvements in many 

 of our fruit-trees by raising new varieties in which the balance 

 between fertility and vegetative growth is so equal that pruning 

 will be reduced to a minimum and grafting superseded. All 

 our experience points to the fact that seedlings from a tree in 

 which vegetative growth is predominant will never be so fruitful 

 as those from a tree in which sexual vigour, whether naturally 

 or artificially produced, is in the ascendant ; and it is a well- 

 known fact that grafting on restrictive stocks favours sexual 

 vigour or fertility. Hence this is a very valuable fact to the 

 hybridist, and one which the young horticulturist will do well 

 to remember. We graft our fruit-trees to render them more 

 fertile ; and it may some day be thought advisable to graft all 

 our flowering shrubs, both hardy and tender, so as to render 

 them more floriferous. As I have already observed, the power 

 of the cultivator and hybridiser or cross-breeder, as the case 

 may be, is immense, and the efforts of each or all tend 



