218 Principles of Plant Culture. : 
until they unite (Fig. 126), after which the graft is cut off 
below, and the stock above, the union. 
b. The top of the stock is cut off with a long sloping cut, 
preferably behind the bud, and the cut surface of the re- 
maining part is inserted beneath the bark of the graft, as 
described in side-grafting (393c), except that the T-cut is 
inverted, and the stock is inserted from beneath. 
The graft is cut off below the point of union when the 
parts are fully united. 
In both these methods the graft should be severed gradu- 
ally, to avoid a check to the growth. 
Section II. TRANSPLANTING 
The processes treated in this, and the succeeding section, 
may be likened to surgical operations in medicine. If plants 
are less highly organized and possess less of sensibility than 
the higher animals, they are, none the less, living heings. 
Violent operations, if necessary, should always be performed 
with this truth in mind. Needless injury and careless hand- 
ling in the treatment of plants are always to be avoided. 
400. Transplanting consists in lifting a plant from 
the medium in which its roots are established, and in re- 
planting the latter, usually in a different location. Trans- 
planting is a violent operation because the younger roots, 
with their root-hairs that absorb the greater part of the 
water required by the plant (103), are, as a rule, largely 
sacrificed in the lifting process. The water supply, so 
vitally important to the plant (63), is thus greatly curtailed 
until new root-hairs can be formed. 
Vigorous plants are better able, as a rule, to endure trans- 
planting than feebler ones, because they can sooner repair 
