% Thomas Andrew Knight, Esq. 83 



luxuriant shoots. These shoots all gardeners, from Langley 

 down to Forsyth, have directed to be shortened in summer, or 

 cut out in the succeeding spring : but I have found great ad- 

 vantages in leaving them wholly unshortened ; when they have 

 uniformly produced the finest possible bearing wood for the 

 succeeding year ; and so far is this practice from having a 

 tendency to render naked the lower, or internal parts of the 

 tree, whence those branches spring, that the strongest shoots 

 they afford invariably issue from the buds near their bases. 

 I have also found that the laterals that spring from these 

 luxuriant shoots, if stopped at the first leaf, often afford 

 very strong blossoms and fine fruit in the succeeding season. 

 Whenever therefore space can be found to train in a luxu- 

 riant shoot, I think it should be rarely or never be either cut 

 out, or shortened : it should, however, never be trained per- 

 pendicularly, where that can be avoided. 



