GIRDLING OR INCISURE. 285 



when united, and thus encircle the shoot. A sharp pruning 

 knife, with a smooth edge and hawk's bill, will also answer the 

 object, but will not execute the work with equal expedition. 

 It is more particularly pursued among us, in order to advance 

 the maturity of the fruit, and increase its size and quality. 

 Its primitive introduction among the ancients was to prevent 

 the coulure or blight ; and Theophrastus, Pliny, and various 

 other writers, mention it as a practice adopted by the vignerons 

 of their respective periods. 



It has also been recommended and practised on various 

 trees by Olivier de Serres, Magnol, Buffon, Duhamel, Rosier, 

 Thouin, &c. the latter of whom carried his experiments to a 

 great extent, and proved its powerful effects not only on the 

 various species of stone fruit, on nut and berry-bearing trees 

 and vines, but on various other families of the vegetable king- 

 dom. The principle, upon which it is based, is the well known 

 theory of the progress of the sap, which ascends in the wood 

 and descends through the bark, and which by this process is 

 retained above the incision, at the same time that its ascent 

 through the wood is not prevented, by which circumstances 

 a far greater proportion is distributed throughout the upper 

 part of the branch, thereby causing the vegetation to be great- 

 ly increased, the fruit and branch to be enlarged in size, and 

 the maturity of the former to be advanced. 



It may be advantageously adopted in very rainy seasons, 

 and when the cold or dampness is such as to render the ma- 

 turity of the crop veny uncertain. But in vineyard or field 

 culture it should not be resorted to in fine seasons, as its object 

 there is simply to counteract the injurious effects, or the un- 

 favourable variations of climate ; and it should only be ap- 

 plied to strong and vigorous vines, and then not frequently, 

 unless they are particularly sterile and subject to blight. It 

 may be done on either the old or new wood, and in Europe is 

 generally confined to that of the preceding year ; but one of 

 our most intelligent experimentalists, S. G. Perkins, Esq. of 

 Massachusetts, recommends operating on the two year old 

 wood ; when done on the young wood, the shoots^are apt to 



