102 TYING ESPALIERS WILLOWS. 



The proper mode of fastening the branches to the 

 rails is not to be overlooked, and ought to be pro- 

 vided for in every garden. How often does it happen 

 that for want of a few willow trees, the easiest of all 

 things to cultivate, recourse is had to tying with 

 pack thread, or strands of bass matting the latter 

 giving way in high winds, and leaving the tree to 

 its fate, the former indeed keeping its hold, but 

 cutting into the bark, and producing diseased 

 growth, which is sure to terminate in canker ! It 

 is therefore a great thing for the comfort of your 

 garden to have plenty of willows; there is no doing 

 without baskets, and the twigs required for tying 

 are innumerable. Several varieties of the willow 

 tribe answer well enough, but the black and the 

 golden are the best; and these, like most things of 

 a more delicate essence, are not the easiest to be had. 

 From slips they do not so certainly strike root, at 

 least on a dry soil, but by a little care in choosing 

 a shady place of some moisture you get rooted plants 

 which may be set any where. It is better to have 

 them planted at random in the shrubbery than in 

 regular crops, which, both by show and convenience, 

 attract the cupidity of tinkers; and to have some 

 growing up as trees (the golden is very ornamental), 

 and some cut over by the ground. The former, in 

 their tree or shrub form, with numerous but short 

 twigs, are not tempting to thieves the latter will 

 be well hid; and both, as they afford shoots of all 

 sizes, will answer all your purposes. The tying of 

 espaliers, with an abundant provision of willows 



