84 GRAFTAGE. 



dening than the art of grafting. It is very clever, it is 

 very interesting, but it will be no great loss if it is abol- 

 ished altogether. It is for the convenience of the nursery- 

 man that it is done in nine cases out of ten, and in nearly 

 all instances it is not only needless, but harmful. * * * 

 If we made the nurserymen give us things on their own 

 roots, they would find some quick means of doing so." 

 A most profuse discussion followed for a period of two 

 years, in which many excellent observers took part. 

 Some of the denunciations of graftage are as follows : 

 "Grafting is always a makeshift, and very often a fraud. " 

 "Grafting is in effect a kind of adulteration. * * * » 

 It is an analogue of the coffee and chicory business. 

 Grafted plants of all kinds are open to all sorts of acci- 

 dents and disaster, and very often the soil, or the climate, 

 or the cultivator, is blamed by employers for evils which 

 thus originated in the nursery. * * * * If, in certain 

 cases, grafting as a convenience has to be resorted to, 

 then let it be root-grafting, a system that eventually af- 

 fords the cion a chance of rooting on its own account in a 

 natural way." "Toy games, such as grafting and bud- 

 ding, will have to be abandoned, and real work must be 

 begun on some sound and sensible plan." "Any fruit- 

 bearing or ornamental tree that will not succeed on its 

 own roots had better go to the rubbish fire at once. We 

 want no coddled or grafted stuff, when own-rooted things 

 are in all ways infinitely better, healthier, and longer- 

 lived." These sweeping statements are made by F. W. 

 Burbidge, of Dublin, a well-known author, whose opinions 

 command attention. The editor of The Garden writes : 

 "We should not plant any grafted tree or shrub, so far 

 as what are called ornamental trees and shrubs are con- 

 cerned. There may be reason for the universal grafting of 

 fruit trees, though we doubt it." These quotations are 

 not cited in any controversial spirit, but simply to show 

 the positiveness with which the practice of graftage is 

 assailed. As the presumption is in favor of any practice 



