on Pyramidal or Espalier Pear Trees. 547 



and below them. This is a great advantage which the mode 

 possesses over budding or side-grafting. 



At the distance of a foot apart for the horizontal branches, 

 it takes as many years to cover the wall as the latter is feet 

 in height ; for although the leading shoot may grow three or 

 four feet in length in a season, yet by shortening it to two 

 feet, although the branches dd would be produced, the buds 

 at bb, to furnish the intermediate stage, most probably would 

 not. In fact, the attempt to form two tiers of horizontals in 

 one season is generally followed by more or less disappoint- 

 ment. The intermediate stage might, however, be readily 

 supplied by the method above detailed ; and a wall twelve 

 feet high might be covered as well in six years as it otherwise 

 would be in twelve." 



Such is the plan as minutely detailed by Mr. Thompson, 

 and fully elucidated by the engraving. It at once shows its 

 superiority over budding or side-grafting, and suggests itself 

 as the most natural mode of accomplishing the end in view, 

 because the inarching acquires its vigor from the branch be- 

 low, and may remain attached to that branch till the union is 

 perfect, and until it gets such strength as to ensure success. 

 It even has greater vigor than a horizontal branch, as the 

 tendency of espalier or pyramid trees to throw up vigorous 

 shoots at or near the stem is well known, and in espalier 

 trees they require constant pinching or cutting out to check 

 their exuberance of growth, the tendency of the sap being 

 upward rather than towards the ends of the horizontal 

 branches. 



Wall or espalier trees are only grown with us to a limited 

 extent, and the appliance of the plan would be of limited ex- 

 tent ; but there are thousands of pyramidal trees cultivated, 

 whose shape may be rendered perfectly symmetrical and 

 beautiful, and the system become one of very great value to 

 all amateurs who delight in possessing perfect specimens of 

 this most desirable style of tree. 



