of Fruit Trees in Kitchen-Gardens. 129 



the end of September, to accelerate the ripening of both wood 

 and fruit ; which it would do, by preventing, in a considerable 

 degree, radiation. 



Having now stated, as far as the limits of a paper of this kind 

 will allow, every thing connected with the mode of arranging 

 fruit trees in kitchen-gardens, I will add a few loose remarks on 

 fruit trees in general ; especially pear trees on walls. Before I 

 proceed farther in this way, methinks I hear some honest gar- 

 dener of the old school lamenting the loss of his early border 

 for peas, or his row of early lettuces : I, however, must contend, 

 that there is not an early crop of vegetables which I could not 

 obtain within one week of those on a wall border, on proper 

 spots in the interior of the quarters, by making artificial slopes, 

 and by careful protection otherwise ; and I beg to remind my 

 nervous friends that, if they think a week of paramount import- 

 ance in such matters, there is still a foot or two of wall border 

 left for the peas, or the other early crops, if they will fain have 

 them in that situation : for the border being 10 ft. or 12 ft. wide, 

 and the trellis not occuping more, at any rate, than 5 ft., the vege- 

 tables may yet come in, though in a more limited quantity. As 

 to pears on walls, although they bear chiefly on spurs from the 

 old wood, after the manner of apricots, plums, &c., yet there is 

 dissimilarity enough to require a somewhat different treatment. 

 In the first place, they cannot endure what I must call a capricious 

 soil ; I mean one that works by fits and starts : such are all 

 light sandy soils, which derive all, or most of, their virtues from 

 manures. Such soils, in the months of June and July, with 

 showery weather, will make pear trees grow more like wil'ow 

 bushes than fruit trees; whereas in dry hot summers the very 

 extreme effects are, of course, produced; and, although such trees 

 may have a good crop of fruit on, little of it will come to proper 

 perfection, in either size or flower, or both will be lamentably 

 deficient. But in a strong loamy soil their growth is steady and 

 uniform, in spite of seasons, and can be depended on ; the sap, 

 also, is more easily controlled, or directed, in trees on such soils. 

 It is of the utmost importance, of course, in all modes of training- 

 whatever, to get as perfect a command over the ascending sap 

 as possible, through the mismanagement of which most of the 

 barrenness so much complained of in pear trees, in my humble 

 opinion, arises. It needs not any pains on my part, I presume, 

 to prove that the free admission of light to all parts of a trained 

 tree is the cause of more pruning and stopping of shoots than 

 is at all times wholesome to the constitution of the tree. The 

 question here assumes a physiological character; and, although 

 " fools rush in where angels fear to tread," yet, having got my 

 foot fairly in, I feel I must proceed in spite of angry critics. As 

 to the effects of shade on the buds of fruit trees, I am quite aware 



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