ABOUT FRUITS, FLOWERS AND FARMING. 321 



however, the tree is supplied with proper food it will bear 

 every year ; at leas*^ such has been the result of my experi- 

 ments. Three years ago, in April, I scraped all the rough 

 bark from the stems of several thousand trees in my 

 orchards, and washed all the trunks and limbs within reach 

 with soft soap ; trimmed out all the branches that crossed 

 each other early in June, and painted the wounded part 

 with white lead, to exclude moisture and prevent decay. I 

 then, in the latter part of the same month, slit the bark by 

 running a sharp-pointed knife from the ground to the fii'st 

 set of limbs, Avhich prevents the tree from becoming bark- 

 bound, and gives the young wood an opportunity of ex- 

 panding. In July I placed one peck of oyster-shell lime 

 Tmder each tree, and left it piled about the trunk until 

 November, during which time the drought was excessive. 

 In November the lime was dug in thoroughly. The follow- 

 ing year I collected from these trees 1,700 barrels of fruit, 

 ])ai t of which was sold in New York for four, and others in 

 London for nine dollars per barrel. The cider made from 

 the refuse, delivered at the mill two days after its manufac- 

 ture, I sold for three dollars and three-quarters per barrel ot 

 thirty-two gallons, exclusive of the barrel. In October I 

 manured these trees with stable manure in which the 

 ammonia had been fixed, and covered this immediately with 

 earth. The succeeding autumn they were literally bending 

 to the ground with the finest fruit I ever saw, while the 

 other trees in my orchard not so treated were quite barren, 

 the last season having been their bearing year. I am now 

 placing round each tree one peck of charcoal dust, and pro- 

 pose in the spring to cover it from the compost heap. 



" ' My soil is a strong, deep, sandy loam on a gravelly 

 subsoil. I cultivate my orchard grounds as if there were 

 no trees on them, and raise grain of every kind except rye, 

 which grain is so very injurious that I believe three suc- 

 cessive crops of it would destroy any orchard younger than 

 twenty years. I raised last year in an orchard containing 



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