FRUIT TREES. Chap. I. 33 



for setting a graft on it as though it were a wound or a break in the mold for new layers, 

 & the graft itself as though it were a patch that restores the mold. But the repair won't 

 take place if the new growths formed by the graft & the stock don't meet and join 

 together. The new growths that emerge from between the wood & the bark won't meet if 

 the outer woody surfaces & the inner cortical surfaces of the graft & the stock don't make 

 contact on the same level and in the same direction and are continuous at least at one 

 point. Nature is forgiving, easily satisfied, & the tree, eager to heal its wound, takes 

 advantage of the least help offered to it. So this relationship, this matching up, this 

 connection, is the most essential condition for the success of the graft. If it's fulfilled, the 

 graft, if made of a branch, soon will produce a woody sheet of its own material between 

 its bark & its wood; or if the graft is merely a piece of bark, between itself and the wood 

 of the stock. Likewise, at the edges of the wound on the stock, a woody sheet emerges 

 from between the wood & the bark that progresses toward the one from the graft. These 

 growths, nothing more than slightly thickened sap, without any defined shape & 

 consistency, join together where they meet. But the woody sheets can't spread beyond the 

 edges of the bark without a cortical sheet that covers them & acts as an outer mold for 

 them. This cortical sheet forms at the same time, spreads & joins up the same way, & 

 then the graft begins to draw its sustenance from the stock. It's only through these new 

 growths that the graft unites with the stock. The wood formed in the graft itself never 

 joins with any part of the stock; it only supports the graft, or serves as an inner mold for 

 its growth. After fulfilling this function, it dries up & dies. In the same way, the bark 

 formed on the graft never unites with any part of the stock; it serves 



