VI. TRAINING AND PRUNING. 



upon the same spot. I remember a gentleman who had 

 an espalier apple-tree of about twenty feet in length, and 

 two very large standard trees of the same sort of fruit, in 

 tha same garden and very near to the same spot. All 

 the three trees were well laden with fruit : I stood looking 

 at them for some time, making an estimate of the crop j 

 and I came to the conclusion that the espalier had more 

 fruit than both the great standards put together, while 

 its fruit was of double the size, or nearly so. I asked 

 him why he did not chop down those two great trees that 

 shaded and spoiled so much of his garden, and plant a 

 couple of espaliers. He had the new-fashioned taste of 

 despising the espaliers, and talked of grubbing this par- 

 ticular one up. In remonstrating with him, I said that 

 the espalier had a greater quantity of fruit upon it then 

 than both the other trees. This appeared to him to be so 

 monstrous, that he offered to bet me a hundred to one, or 

 more, against my opinion. I declined the bet 3 but he 

 promised, that, when he gathered the fruit, which was to 

 be done in a few days, he would have if measured and give 

 me an account of the result, which, to his utter astonish- 

 ment, he found to be that the espalier contained half a 

 bushel more than both the other trees put together. The 

 eye always deceives itself in comparing things irregularly 

 placed with things placed with regularity. So much, 

 then, for the training of espaliers. The pruning ; that is 

 to say, the pruning of the limbs, is as follows. Apples, 

 and, indeed, all the other trees which I have spoken of to 

 be planted for espaliers, bear upon spurs, some shorter, 

 and some longer j not like peach-trees which have their 

 fruit upon shoots of the last year. Sometimes, indeed, 

 apples, and these other trees will bear upon the last 



