IS GRAFTAGE PERNICIOUS ? 83 



to cultivated plants, for all cultivation is itself unnatural 

 in this ordinary sense. 



But it is difficult to see why the union of cion and stock 

 is any more mysterious or unusual than the rooting of cut- 

 tings ; in fact, it has always seemed to me to be the simpler 

 and more normal process of the two. A wounded surface 

 heals over as a matter of protection to the plant, and when 

 two wounded surfaces of consanguineous plants are closely 

 applied, nothing is more natural than that the nascent cells 

 should interlock and unite. In other words, there is no 

 apparent reason why two cells from different allied s^ems 

 should refuse to unite any more than two cells from the 

 same stem. But why bits of stem should throw out roots 

 from their lower portion and leaves from their upper por- 

 tion, when both ends may be to every human sense exactly 

 alike, is indeed a mystery. Healing is regarded as one of 

 the necessary functions of stems, but rooting cannot be so 

 considered. 



This much is said by way of preface in order to eliminate 

 any preconception that graftage is in principle and essence 

 opposed to nature, and is therefore fundamentally wrong. 

 A large part of the discussion of the philosophy of grafting 

 appears to have been random, because of a conviction or 

 assumption that it is necessarily opposed to natural 

 processes. 



It does not follow from these propositions, however, 

 that graftage is a desirable method of multiplying plants, 

 but simply that the subject must be approached by means 

 of direct and positive evidence. Much has been said during 

 the last few years concerning the merits of graftage, and 

 the opponents of the system have made the most sweeping 

 statements of its perniciousness. This recent discussion 

 started from an editorial which appeared in The Field, an 

 English journal, and which was copied in The Garden of 

 January 26, 1889, with an invitation for discussion of the 

 subject. The article opens as follows: "We doubt if 

 ■there is a greater nuisance in the whole practice of gar- 



