BEV. W. KINGSLET ON THE FEriTINO OF SEEDLINGS. 123 
trees that have originated in suckers from old ungrafted trees. 
In almost all these cases, whether apple, pear, plum, peach, or 
orange, the wood was thorny ; and though I cut back, and used 
the cuttings for scions, all had the same thorny and fruitless 
character. 
However, in experimenting upon a set of seedling peaches, 
some were allowed to grow wild, some steadily pinched-in, some 
cut-in closely and pinched, and some trained as single rods ; all 
these last fruited as soon as the shoot got beyond the thorny part 
of the stem. It then occurred to me that it was only necessary 
to get beyond this part of the growth as quickly as possible. This 
is done by encouraging the growth of the young seedlings to a 
single upright shoot, and then using the point of that shoot as a 
scion on a strong stock ; then the shoot from this scion is to be 
again trained at full length, and its point again used as a scion. 
In this way a shoot may be got having buds 20 feet or more 
from the root in a couple of years. The old seedling trees 
may thus be grafted with the scions from themselves ; but it is 
better to graft them in their third year with a scion taken 
from an intermediate grafted tree. It may be necessary to stop 
the leader to be used as a scion by the end of August, to ensure 
its ripening ; but this will not seriously affect its nature. I can 
speak from experience of the success of the process in the case of 
peaches and oranges, and some plums ; pears and apples I have 
not yet tried ; but I may also mention that I have in this way 
got over the difficulty with thorny pear-trees. The trees that I 
could not get to fruit had been grafted with scions taken off too 
near the root, the sorts being new ones. By selecting the scion 
near the root, or far from it, a grafted tree would be produced that 
would bear only after a long interval, or quickly, according to 
the gardener's will. At any rate, what has been said shows the 
importance of choosing the point of leading shoots as the scions 
for forming dwarf trees. I should very much prefer having some 
independent experiments tried to trusting entirely to my own, 
and therefore hope some one or more of the Royal Horticultural 
Society will take the matter up ; and in the mean time any dis- 
cussion this statement may provoke will be of service to horticul- 
tural science. 
