214 



FRUITS. 



[chap. 



because it is cankered : in many cases, the cankered part of the 

 tree bears best ; and it so happens that I have an apple-tree, at 

 this time, one limb of which is half cut off by the canker ; that 

 limb bears more than all the rest of the tree ; and it was from 

 that very limb that I cut the branch of beautiful fall-pippins that 

 were exhibited last autumn (1828) at my shop in Fleet-street. So 

 that a tree is not to be despised merely because it is cankered. 

 The canker comes very frequently from bruises given to the tree 

 by the carelessness of gardeners, or by the friction of limbs one 

 against another. It very frequently comes from the rubbing of 

 limbs and branches against the stakes ; and this makes it so 

 dangerous to plant great trees for an orchard. However, I have 

 seen apple-trees that were old and cankered when I was a boy, 

 and that continue to bear well unto this day. It is a thing to be 

 guarded against, and to be got rid of if possible : it is sometimes 

 fatal, but by no means generally so. 



290. COTTON-BLIGHT.— This disease makes its appear- 

 ance like little bunches of cotton-wool stuck upon the joints or 

 along the shoots of apple-trees, which leave, after they are rubbed 

 off, little round pimples or lumps ; and it does the same with 

 regard to the roots that it does to the limbs and the shoots. 

 Under this w hite stuff, there are innumerable insects, which, when 

 squeezed by the finger, are of the colour of blood. It is a very 

 nasty thing, very pernicious to apple-trees ; and it also comes on 

 the joints of vines. There is no cure but rubbing the stuff off" 

 mechanically as fast as it appears, and washing the place well 

 with something strong, such as tobacco juice. The potato, 

 which some people look upon as so nutritious, very nearly poisons 

 the water in which it is boiled ; and an Irish gentleman once told 

 me that that water would cure the cotton-blight. Rubbing the 

 part with mercurial ointment will certainly do it ; but then you 

 must get at the root as well as at the limbs and the branches : if 

 you take up a young tree that has the cotton-blight, cut the 

 knobs off from the roots, cleanse the tree perfectly well and re- 

 plant it, and it is very likely the disease will not return. If it 

 once get complete possession of a large tree, the tree will soon 

 become useless. But, as this pest spreads itself in the ground round 

 about the trees, and there seems to nestle during the winter, I re- 

 commend good cultivation of the ground under apple-trees, if only 

 to disturb and confound the operations of this destroyer. Moving 



