PRUNING. 



257 



most healthy food. By diiFereDt manipulations it furnishes 

 two kinds of flour, a gruel and a parenchyma, which may 

 be applied to increase the bulk of bread made from grain. 

 Treated chymically, it is converted into beer, vinegar, 

 spirits, &c." 



PRUNING. — In pruning the apple-tree and all other 

 standard trees, the points of the external branches should 

 be every v/here rendered thin and pervious to the light ; 

 so that the internal par i of the tree may not be wholly 

 shaded by the external parts. The light should netrate 

 deeply into the tree, on every side ; but not an) where 

 through it. When the pruner has judiciously executed his 

 work, every part of the tree, internal as well as external, 

 will be productive of fruit ; and the internal part, in unfa- 

 vourable seasons, will rather receive protection than inji --y 

 from the external. A tree, thus pruned, will not only pr^ 

 duce much more fruit, but will also be able to support a 

 heavier load of it, without danger of being broken; for any 

 given weight will depress the branch, not simply in propor- 

 tion to its quantity, and its horizontal distance from the 

 point of suspension, by a mode of action similar to that of 

 the vv^eight of the beam of the steel-yard ; and hence a 

 hundred a.nd 'Miy pounds, suspended at one foot distance 

 from the trunk, will distress the branch, which supports it^ 

 no more than ten pounds at fifteen feet distance would do 

 Every tree will, therefore, support a larger weight of fruit, 

 without danger of being broken, in proportion as the parts 

 of such weight are m^ade to approach nearer to its centre. 



''Each variety of the apple-tree has its own peculiar 

 form of growth ; and this it will ultimately assume, in a 

 considerable degree, in defiance of the art of the pruner. 

 Something may nevertheless be done to correct whatever 

 is defective. When the growth of any variety is weak 

 and reclining, the principal stem should be trained to a 

 considerable height, before it be allowed to produce branch- 

 es ; and if any of these take a horizontal or pendent direc- 

 tion, they should be regularly taken off. One principal 

 leading stem should be encouraged almost to the summit of 

 the tree, to prevent a sudden division into two large boughs 

 of nearly equal strength ; for the fork which these form is 

 apt to divide and break, when the branches are loadf-d with 

 fruit. All efforts to give young trees a round and regularly 

 spreading form, whilst in the nursery, will be found injuri- 

 ous in the future stages of their growth. Large branches 



