256 



M. P. at Holkham Hall, Norfolk, there are 

 two mulberry-trees trained to a trellis, upon a 

 south wall. These trees are about 16 feet 

 high, and the lateral extent of the branches 

 of one of them is upwards of 94 feet, and the 

 other exceeds 97 feet. They have been 

 planted about 30 years; and it is found that 

 the fruit is much larger than that produced on 

 standard trees, and their time of maturity 

 much earlier, and affording an abundant suc- 

 cession from the middle of July until October. 

 They are pruned twice a year, leaving spurs 

 of two inches long, which, at the winter 

 pruning, are shortened to about an inch in 

 length. It is both a common and a bad prac- 

 tice to make grass-plats under mulberry-trees, 

 by this means retarding the ripening of the 

 fruit by the coolness of the grass; whereas 

 the heat reflected from the earth would 

 greatly promote the ripening. 



The mulberry must have been a most 

 valuable tree to the Persians and Chinese in 

 ancient times, on account of it's leaves feeding 

 the silk-worms, which enabled them to supply 

 all the known world with silk, the price of 

 which, in Europe, was an equal weight of 

 pure gold, even as late as Justinian's time, 

 A. D. 526. Madame de Genlis gives the 

 invention of silks to the Chinese: she relates 



