4 On the Objects zvhich the Society have in view. 



acquainted with the mode of culture best calculated to produce 

 the necessary changes in the constitution and habit of plants, 

 attentive observation and experience will soon discover it ; 

 and experiments have already been made, which prove the 

 facility of raising as fine varieties of fruit in this country, as 

 any which have been imported from others. 



Almost every plant, the existence of which is not confined 

 to a single summer, admits of two modes of propagation ; 

 by division of its parts, and by seed. By the first of these 

 methods we are enabled to multiply an individual into 

 many ; each of which, in its leaves, its flowers,, and fruit, per r 

 manently retains, in every respect, the character of the pa- 

 rent stock. No new life is here generated ; and the graft, the 

 layer, and cutting, appear to possess the youth and vigour, 

 or the age and debility, of the plant, of which they once 

 formed a part.* No permanent improvement has therefore 

 ever been derived, or can be expected, from the art of the 

 grafter, or the choice of stocks of different species, or varie- 

 ties : for, to use the phrase of Lord Bacon, the graft in all 

 cases overruleth the stock, from which it receives aliment, but 

 no motion. Seedling plants, on the contrary, of every culti- 

 vated species, sport in endless variety. By selection from 

 these, therefore, we can only hope for success in our pursuit 

 of new and improved varieties of each species of plant or 

 fruit; and to promote experiments of this kind, the Horti- 

 cultural Society propose to give some honorary premiums 



* The diseased state of young grafted trees of the Golden Pippin, and the 

 debasement of the flavour of that fruit, afford one, amongst a thousand instances, 

 which may be adduced, of the decay of those varieties of fruit which have been 

 long propagated by grafting, &c. 



