76 FRUIT CULTURE UNDER GLASS. 



and the plants lifted and placed on a similar bed of 

 turf, but this time from 9 inches to 12 inches apart, 

 and filled in round about with soil of the same char- 

 acter as at first, avoiding manure of any sort. Here 

 they soon began to grow rapidly again ; and when 

 they had attained the height of 3 feet, and the borders 

 were ready for them, they were cut round as in the 

 first instance, and allowed to stand till a fresh set of 

 young roots were just started, when they were raised 

 on a spade, with ball quite entire, and placed in their 

 new borders. This operation was easily performed, 

 and they received not the smallest check, but grew 

 rapidly at once ; and when cut back — some to 1 

 feet and others to 3 feet — ^just eleven months from 

 the day the eyes were placed in the sand, their 

 average girth is from 2 to 3 inches ; and they are 

 ripe, close -jointed, and solid as hazel-sticks to the 

 apex of the houses — some 22 feet. Those that were 

 not required for planting were potted ; and for this 

 purpose I can as strongly recommend the system as 

 for planting. When vines prepared thus come to be 

 turned out of their pots in the process of planting, 

 there is no occasion for breaking up the ball, for there 

 are no coiled roots in it to disentangle — they are more 

 like those of a box or privet bush than a vine, as 

 usually seen ; and when planted, they begin by taking 

 their work before them, instead of running away out 

 of the border. 



" So much for the vines. And now as to what may 

 be done with a view to retaining this tendency to a 

 multiplication of small active roots across the border. 

 Just make up 3 feet of it inside and 3 feet outside the 

 house the first year. In April or May of the second 

 year, fork down 1 or 2 inches of the face of this bank 



