THE PEACH. 595 



while we have secured against the prevalent evil, an over-crop, 

 we have also provided for the 

 full nourishment of the present 

 year's fruit, and induced a sup- 

 ply of fruit-bearing shoots 

 throughout the tree, for the next 

 season. 



This course of pruning is fol- 

 lowed regularly, every year, for 

 the whole life of the tree. It is 

 done much more rapidly than 

 one would suppose; the pruned A peach tree pruned by the shorten- 

 wounds are too small to cause ing-in mode. 



any gum to flow ; and it is done 



at the close of winter, when labour is worth least to the culti- 

 vator. 



The appearance of a tree pruned in this way, after many 

 years of bearing, is a very striking contrast to that of the poor 

 skeletons usually seen. It is, in fact, a fine object, with a thick, 

 low, bushy head, filled with healthy young wood, and in the 

 summer with an abundance of dark-green, healthy foliage, and 

 handsome fruit. Can any intelligent man hesitate about adopt- 

 ing so simple a course of treatment to secure such valuable 

 results? We recommend it with entire confidence to the 

 practice of every man in the country that cultivates a peach 

 tree. After he has seen and tasted its good effects, we do net 

 fear his laying it aside.* 



* "While this is going through the press, our attention is drawn to the 

 following remarkable examples of the good effects of regular pruning, 

 which we translate from the leading French Journal of Horticulture. "We 

 ask the attention of our readers to these cases, especially after perusing 

 our remarks on the Yellows and its cause: 



" M. Duvilliers laid before the Royal Society of Horticulture an account 

 of some old peach trees that he had lately seen at the Chateau de Villiers, 

 near Ferte-Aleps (Seine- et-Oise). These trees, eight in number, are grow- 

 ing upon a terrace wall, which they cover perfectly, and yield abundant 

 crops. The gardener assured M. Duvilliers that they had been under his 

 care during the thirty years that he had been at the chateau ; that they 

 were as large when he first saw them as at present, and that he supposed 

 them to be at least sixty years old. We cannot doubt (says the editor) that 

 it is to the annual pruning that these peach trees owe this long life', for the 

 peach trees that are left to themselves in the latitude of Paris never live beyond 

 twenty or thirty years. M. Duvilliers gave the accurate measurement ot 

 the trunks and branches of these trees, and stated, what it is more inter- 

 esting to know, that although all their trunks are hollow, like those ot 

 old willows, yet their vigour and fertility are still quite unimpaired. (An- 

 nales de la Societe d' Horticulture, tome xxx. p. 58.) 



In volume 25, page 67, of the same journal, is an account of a remark- 

 able peach tree in the demesne of M. Joubert, near Villeneuve le Roi 

 (departement de i'Yonne). It is trained against one of the wings of the 

 oiansion, covers &. large space with its branches, and the circumference ol 



