116 On the Propagation of the Mulberry Tree. 



it is therefore expedient that the gardener should, in the 

 first instance, make the most ample provision conveniently 

 within his power for their maintenance, and that he should 

 subsequently attend very closely to the economical expendi- 

 ture of such provision. 



The autumn appears to be generally the most eligible 

 season for preparing cuttings, because the wounds will not 

 then be recent in spring, and because the buds will better 

 adapt their first movements to their new situation ; and better 

 cuttings will be obtained from scions, which have sprung 

 from the trunk and lower branches, in all cases where very 

 early maturity is not required, than from the extremities of 

 the bearing branches ; for in the latter the powers of vege- 

 table life are less alert and active, and the cuttings of these 

 neither take root as freely, nor afford as large trees, and are 

 therefore to be chosen only when the planter is anxious soon 

 to receive a part of the reward of his labours, from such spe- 

 cies of fruit-trees, as, under other modes of culture, long 

 exercise his patience. 



I have stated in the Horticultural Transactions* of 1808 

 that a Mulberry tree, obtained by grafting by approach, 

 had produced fruit at three years old : and I have subse- 

 quently given an opinion, which I am quite confident is well 

 founded, that trees possessing the same property might be 

 obtained by other means ; for that every detached part of a 

 bearing branch, by whatever means it be insulated from the 

 tree, of which it once formed a part, always retains a strong 

 bias to resume its former and natural habits; and under 

 these impressions, I made the experiments which I shall pro- 

 ceed to detail. 



* Vol.i. page 61. 



