264 Defects in the Management of Fruit Trees. 



to expect it. In such gardens, it often happens that very strik- 

 ing effects are produced by a judicious disposition of plants of 

 the most common description ; and I think it would be a 

 very useful study to endeavour to imitate them with plants of 

 more rare and choice species. I was once much struck by a 

 particular effect (not, however, of sufficient general interest for 

 a place in your Magazine) produced by a plant of the common 

 hop ; and it was not until after many trials that I could find a 

 substitute for it among more choice plants : at length, however, I 

 succeeded to my own satisfaction by means of one of the genus 

 Clematis ; the species I do not with certainty know, as it has 

 never flowered during the three years that it has been in my 

 garden. 



In small gardens, nothing can be more unpleasing than a 

 want of neatness and high finish ; it reminds me of a flower- 

 painter of the last century, who used the most dingy and sombre 

 colours that he could find, saying that he imitated Raphael, and 

 painted for posterity. In the case of a small garden, it should 

 be remembered that, whatever may be the beauty of the design, 

 constant attention, and the frequent removal of plants, are in- 

 dispensable : three or four years of neglect would leave nothing, 

 either to posterity or the designer himself, but a tangled and 

 matted thicket of such plants as might come off conquerors in 

 the struggle for life incident to want of sufficient space. 



Hastings, April, 1834. 



Art. V. On Defects in the Management of Fruit Trees. 

 By Mr. Robert Errington. 



Although so much has been said and written about various 

 modes of training and managing fruit trees, you may, perhaps, 

 yet spare room for a few more remarks on the subject. It will 

 be generally admitted, I think, even by most practical men (by 

 the by, a class rather slow to admit any thing which implicates 

 themselves), that the cultivation of fruit trees generally is not 

 so successful as might be desired, and, from long practice, ex- 

 pected. My attention is at this time called to the subject by some 

 remarks of yours, IX. 671.? in which you say, " We shall be much 

 surprised, if, when the doctrine of disbudding comes to be gene- 

 rally understood, it does not effect a very considerable change 

 in the mode of managing every description of fruit tree which 

 requires to be trained in any particular form, or kept within 

 any particular bounds less than what are natural to it." Your 

 remarks I consider just in a very considerable degree; and hence 

 appears the propriety, and, I may fairly say, necessity, of adding 

 philosophical to practical knowledge in our profession. The com- 



