96 
establish itself on a deciduous stock, but a deciduous scion never 
takes on an evergreen stock. The loquat, an evergreen, can be 
worked on the quince, a deciduous tree, although the reverse is not 
attended with success. Experience only can teach which kind adapt 
themselves to each other. 
The popular mind is somewhat imbued with the idea that the 
resultant effect of the intimate union of two plants is often a cross 
which exhibits some of the characteristics of both parents. The 
fable of the orange becoming blood red in consequence of its being 
grafted on the pomegranate finds a fertile ground in the imagina- 
tion of a great many. Some still believe that the rose grows black 
when grafted upon the black currant bush, and wonderful tales are 
told of the marvellous union of some of the most dissimilar plants. 
Whenever such plants strike, it is invariably owing to the fact that 
one of them has struck root like an ordinary cutting and then 
pushes forth on its own independent accord. 
In a graft, both the stock and the scion continue to behave the 
one independently of the other, as if they had nothing in common. 
If a longitudinal section is made of a graft, and if that section 1s 
smoothly polished, the outlines of the original graft can easily be 
seen; in this is the more striking, when the grain of the wood and 
its colour are more dissimilar: a peach grafted on a plum offers 
a good illustration of this juxtaposition. This fact is at times very 
clearly brought to our notice by the clean rupture of the tree at the 
point of grafting many years after the tree has left the nursery. 
The only direct influence of the stock on the scion is the degree of 
vigour which it imparts to it. This is noticeable in the ease of 
pears grafted on sturdy seedlings of the wild pear, or on quince 
roots, or again on apples worked on Northern Spy or on the dwarf- 
ing Paradise stock, and, further, on cherries worked on Mazzard or 
on Morello and Mahaleb roots. 
A graft, therefore, only differs from a cutting in this much—-that 
in its case the soil is replaced by the stock. Its growth is not so 
directly influenced by the fertility of the soil in which it grows as 
by the nature and the greater or lesser amount of vigour of the 
stock which carries it. One common stock is often seen carrying 
several grafts of as many varieties, and the produce from each of 
the individual grafts is in no way influenced by the one growing 
next to it. 
If grafting does not affect characteristics of the fruit, it often 
improves the size, the sweetness of the fruit, and the productiveness 
of the plant. It is a well-known fact that most budded or grafted 
trees bear earlier and bear more evenly than trees of the same sort 
growing on their own roots. Indeed, experiments made by grafting 
and budding on seedling trees, scions and buds taken from these 
very same trees, have imparted to the limbs operated upon the 
characters of early production noticeable in worked trees; such trees 
