PROPAGATION BY GRAFTING. 45 
and, for dwarfing, P. Mahaleb. For apricots, seedlings of 
the wilding apricot, with the muscle and Brussels plum. 
For peaches and nectarines, seedlings-of the muscle, white 
pear-plum, and Damas noir plum, the almond, and the 
wilding peach. 
Stocks are commonly divided into two classes, viz., free 
stocks and dwarfing stocks. The former consist of séed- 
ling plants, which naturally attain to the same size as the 
trees from which the cions are taken. The latter are plants 
of diminutive growth, either varieties of the same species, 
or species of the same genus as the cion, which have a ten- 
dency to lessen the expansion of the engrafted tree. The 
Paradise or doucin is the usual dwarfing stock for apples, 
the Quince for pears, the Bullace for plums, and Prunus 
Mahaleb (Cerasus Mahaleb, or sweet-scented cherry), for 
cherries. The nature of the soil in which the grafted trees 
are destined to grow should also have weight in determin- 
ing the choice of stocks. When the garden is naturally 
moist, it is proper to graft pears on the quince, because 
this plant agrees with a moist soil, and at the same time 
the luxuriance thereby produced is checked by the stock. 
In France, peaches are commonly budded on almond stocks 
to adapt them to the dry soils of that country. The seeds 
from which stocks are to be raised are generally sown in 
beds in March; but the germination of some kinds is pro- 
moted by placing the seed for a time, in damp sand in a 
green-house. Next season the seedlings are transplanted 
into nursery rows, in which they are allowed to reach the 
size necessary for the various forms of fruit-trees hereafter 
to be mentioned. 
The cion is always a portion of the wood of the preceding 
year. As the diseases incident to fruit trees are apt to be 
transmitted by this mode of propagation, it is desirable 
