DIFFERENT MODES OF GRAFTING. 67 



fore most decidedly of opinion, that the stock in 

 some degree partakes of the nature of the scion 

 which is grafted on it ; for if we look at the 

 nature and constitution of a tree, and from prac- 

 tice mark its general progress, there cannot be 

 an existing doubt, that the roots, veins, fibres, or 

 whatever they may be called, which strike from 

 the scion into the stock, must take root and run 

 downwards, and that to the very extremity 

 where the sap flows ; this I am further convinced 

 of by putting the graft on the centre of the 

 stock instead of the side, for you always find 

 them make a considerably better growth, and 

 the trees are more durable ; therefore, if the 

 graft sends its roots down to the very extremi- 

 ties of the roots of the stock, it either becomes 

 impregnated, it must be the stock and not the 

 scion. 



The same by budding; if nature had so 

 ordered it, that the stock should have had any 

 influence on grafting, much more must it have 

 had on budding, where there is nothing left but 

 the mere rind ; yet this small bud has been in 

 no instance ever known to degenerate on account 

 of the stock, if budded on a stock it was fond of. 



