THE HEALTH AND ENERGY OF THE TREE 47 



difference in trees as there is in cows. We may not know 

 why. But even so, it is our part to do the best we can: 

 this is our privilege. 



The tillage and care of plants lessen the struggle for 

 existence. So is the apple-tree protected from the crowds, 

 from contest for moisture and food, from insects, and 

 from the competition within itself. Thereby is it able 

 to express all its possibilities. Even the dormant poten- 

 tialities may be wakened, and the plant makes a wide 

 departure from its native state. This is not an original 

 state of sin, but a state of repression in which it is held 

 in a world that is full of so many things beside apple- 

 trees. I may till my orchard ever so well, manipulate the 

 trees ever so promptly, yet if the plantation then is al- 

 lowed to run to neglect the processes of depreciation gain 

 the mastery ; the struggle for existence is restored. 



To keep one's apple-tree in the pink of perfection is 

 as joyful an enterprise as to do anything else well. It is 

 only the well-conditioned tree that yields its glorious 

 harvest year by year. 



