86 THE MINIATURE FEUIT GAEDEN 



many years. The great advantages reaped by the 

 planter is the constant productiveness of his trees ; from 

 the second year after planting they will be always ' pay- 

 ing their way.' 



The unprejudiced fruit cultivator will quickly find 

 out the great advantage of this mode of apple and pear 

 cultivation, and those who wish to cultivate apples and 

 pears for market purposes may, with a sound prospect of 

 success, if the soil and climate are favourable, plant 

 apples on the English Paradise stock, and pears on the 

 quince stock, either as pyramids or bushes, four and six 

 feet apart, row from row, the former distance for dwarf 

 prolific sorts, the latter for robust growers. This dis- 

 tance will admit of crops of black or red currants and 

 gooseberries in the centre between each row for several 

 years, until the orchard trees — which must be under 

 summer pruning — cover the ground. 



In the usual old-fashioned mode. Standard apple 

 trees are planted in orchards at 20 feet apart, or 108 

 trees to the acre; if the soil be good and the trees 

 properly planted, and the planter a healthy middle-aged 

 man, he may hope, at the end of his threescore and ten, 

 to see his trees commence to bear, and may die with the 

 reflection that he has left a valuable orchard as a legacy 

 to his children, but has not had much enjoyment of it 

 during his life. 



Plantations made at four feet apart may in the course 

 of a few' years be brought to a permanent distance for 

 pyramidal trees, that of twelve feet apart; the trees 



