FRUITS. CHAP 



off by the canker ; that limb bears more than all the rest 

 of the treej and it was from that very limb that I cut 

 the branch of beautiful fall-pippins that were exhibited 

 List autumn at my shop in Fleet-street. So that, a tree is 

 not to be despised merely because it is cankered. The 

 canker comes very frequently from bruises given to the 

 tree by the carelessness of gardeners, or by the friction 

 of limbs one against another. It very frequently comes 

 from the rubbing of limbs and branches against the 

 stakes 5 and this makes it so dangerous to plant great 

 trees for an orchard. However, I have seen apple-trees 

 that were old and cankered when I was a boy, and that 

 continue to bear well unto this day. It is a thing to be 

 guarded against, and to be got rid of if possible : it is 

 sometimes fatal, but by no means generally so. 



289. COTTON-BLIGHT. This disease makes its~ap- 

 pearance like little bunches of cotton-wool stuck upon 

 the joints or along the shoots of apple-trees, which 

 leave, after they be rubbed off, little round pimples or 

 lumps j and it does the same with regard to the roots 

 that it does to the limbs and the shoots. Under this 

 white stuff, there are innumerable insects, which, when 

 squeezed by the ringer, are of the colour of blood. It is 

 a very nasty thing, very pernicious to apple-trees : and 

 it also comes on the joints of vines. There is no cure 

 but rubbing the stuff off mechanically, as fast as it ap- 

 pears, and washing the place well with something strong, 

 such as tobacco-juice. The potatoe, which some people 

 look upon as so nutritious, very nearly poisons the water 

 in which it is boiled ; and an Irish gentleman once told 

 me that that water would cure the cotton blight. Rub- 



