72 RECOVERY OF PEAR TREES. 



neglect or bad training, may be wonderfully re- 

 claimed. Leaving the espaliers to be afterwards 

 called to account, we suppose, in the case of an 

 aged pear upon your wall, that its branches have 

 got as thick as your arm, and bear only at the 

 farther extremities all the spurs near the centre 

 being quite effete, and nine tenths of the tree nearly 

 fruitless; yet by the following method may such 

 a tree, in the course of two years, become the wealth 

 and ornament of your garden. By means of a 

 large chisel and mallet, let every alternate branch 

 be taken out, with a clean cut, close by the main 

 stem; and, with the same implements, smooth off 

 all the fruitless spurs of the remaining branches 

 near the middle of the tree. Several young shoots 

 will spring where the alternate branches have been 

 amputated. Of these, let one be laid to the wall, 

 to run along the site of the former branch; and let 

 another be trained along the front of the remain- 

 ing branch, not scrupling to nail it to the wood, 

 smoothed of its spurs, in the same manner as the 

 other is nailed to the wall. In this way proceed to 

 fill all the vacant spaces, and to furnish the naked 

 front of every old limb of the tree. In the first 

 year, supposing your wall to be three yards in 

 height, you will have, perhaps, six square yards 

 covered with young wood, and ready for full bear- 

 ing in the second year; and that, too, in a quarter 

 where no fruit had appeared for a long period before. 

 But this is not the only region where you may 

 have the benefit of young wood, and consequently 



