DELACEOIX'S METHOD. 297 



Bmaller end, instead of becoming the seat of dryness, which is always 

 more or less injurious, becomes a passage for absorption. The bud, 

 which, under these circumstances, is the only part exposed to the air, 

 bears, without injury, or rather with advantage, all the causes of 

 excitement. Although I did not commence my experiments before the 

 end of June, I have seen quite enough to satisfy me that the method 

 may be of serious advantage. Two drills about three inches apart were 

 drawn parallel with each other, in a kitchen garden of indifferent 

 quality, situated on a calcareous plain near Besangon. A hundred 

 cuttings of Apples, Pears, Plums, Apricots, Tulip-trees, Eoses, &c., 

 almost aU. of this year's wood, were bent and buried in the manner 

 described, with their ends in the two drills. They were watered a few 

 times, and at this moment every cutting, in the open air, and exposed 

 to the fuU sunshine, is just as fresh as it was when planted. In most 

 of them, the part exposed to the air (the bud) is the seat of active 

 vegetation, especially in the Pears and Tulip-trees, the buds of which 

 have already made some progress." 



Another ready mode of dealing with cuttings, when the means of the 

 propagator are circumscribed, is that of striking in vials of water. A 

 correspondent of the Gardeners' Chronicle thus describes his practice. 

 " I tie vial-bottles together by the necks, and hang them in the windows 

 of our small greenhouse, having filled them with clean soft water. I 

 then put in slips of Salvia, Calceolaria, Mimulus, Myrtle, or anything I 

 wish to propagate of the same description of plants ; in about two or 

 three weeks, or a month, the little silver-like roots appear, and in a 

 week or ten days I plant them in small pots well watered ; they never 

 seem to flag or mind the change, and I rarely lose a slip. Myrtles are 

 longer in forming roots — cuttings from the same plant have varied from 

 six weeks to twelve months : they were put in in November. A string of 

 bottles I also hang against the back of the greenhouse, where they have 

 plenty of Ught, and they do equally well, though not quite so qviickly." 

 The practice is old, and well suited to soft-wooded plants. Even some 

 hard- wooded kinds, such as Azaleas, strike freely in this manner. 



Conifers may be increased by cuttings. About the month of 

 September, or any time when the wood is three parts ripe, procure 

 cuttings of the current year's growth with a small portion of the old 

 wood attached, or what is termed a heel, selecting the small terminal 

 short-jointed shoots, which are those most likely to form leaders; for 

 although you may strike some of the more weakly side-shoots much 

 easier and quicker, they are afterwards of little value, as they frequently 

 are years before they form a good leader. Having procured the cuttings 

 fresh from the tree, which is of great consequence,— for if they are 

 allowed to remain any considerable time before they are put in after 

 separation from the mother plant, there is Uttle hope of success,— 

 prepare them by taking the bottom leaves partly off, which should 



