PRUNING. 



225 



unprotected for several months ; whereas if wounds 

 be made when the vital member or envelope is every 

 day extending itself they are sooner closed, and if 

 not very large, completely covered before the growth 

 ceases in autumn, or, at any rate, early in the fol- 

 lowing summer. It should be a rule with the pruner 

 never to make a wound that cannot be closed in the 

 course of twelve months ; but he can only attend to 

 this rule by a timely application of the knife or 

 chisel. A hand-saw should never be used in pruning 

 forest trees, because if the irregular branch be so 

 large as to require this tool, it had far better be left 

 where it is. Very tall and handsome boles may be 

 formed by the assistance of long ladders, hand-saws, 

 and jack-planes ; but though these large and carefully 

 polished wounds will be in a few years covered with 

 healthy bark and wood, the internal scar will ever 

 remain a flaw in the timber. (Fig. 53.) These cir- 

 cumstances show at once the absolute necessity of 

 pruning at an early age of the tree, for though all 

 Fig. 53. 



Section of a stem of sixteen years' growth, to show the effect of 

 pruning off a large hranch in the tenth year. 



Q 



