S18 SADDLE-GRAFTING. 



being grafted, otherwise tlie grafts, especially those with fleshy leaves, 

 are apt to hreak off when they attain to any size. I have also grafted 

 E. trunoatum upon a stock of Cactus brazUiensis, which makes an 

 excellent standard, as from its robust habit it does not require any 

 support. E. trunoatum succeeds better if suspended, with a ball of 

 earth about its roots, in a wire basket filled with moss, than when 

 grown in a pot." 



The brillLant effect produced by plants treated in this manner may be 

 judged of from the accompanying sketch (Pig. XLIX.) of a specimen 

 growing in the year 1847, in the garden of Mrs. Huskisson of Eartham, 

 where it had been made by Mr. Webster, her Gardener. 



A far better method than whip -grafting, but more tedious, 

 is saddle-grafting, in which the stock is pared obliquely 

 on both sides, till it becomes an inverted wedge, ahd the 

 scion is sHt up the centre, after which its sides are pared 

 down till they fit the sides of the stock. In this method the 

 greatest possible quantity of cellular surface is brought into 

 contact, and the parts are mutually so adjusted, that the 

 ascending sap is freely received from the stock by the scion, 

 while, at the same time, the descending sap can flow freely 

 from the scion into the stock. Mr. Knight, in describing this 

 mode of operating, has the following observations : — 



" The graft first begins its efforts to unite itself to the stock 

 just at the period when the formation of a new internal layer 

 of bark commences in the spring ; and the fluid which generates 

 this layer of bark, and which also feeds the inserted graft, 

 radiates in every direction from the vicinity of the medulla to 

 the external surface of the alburnum. The graft is, of course, 

 most advantageously placed when it presents the largest 

 surface to receive such fluid, and when the fluid itself is made 

 to deviate least from its ;iatural course. This takes place most 

 efficiently when (as in this saddle-grafting) a graft of nearly 

 equal size with the stock is divided at its base and made to stand 

 astride the stock, and when the two divisions of the graft are 

 pared extremely thin, at and near their lower extremities, so 

 that they may be brought into close contact with the stock 

 (from which but little bark or wood should be pared off) by the 

 ligature." {Hort. Trans., v. 147.) To execute saddle-grafting 

 properly, the scion and stock should be of equal size ; and 



