STEtJAilT'S planter's GUIDE. 241 



strike out immediately in the new moist soft soil ; 

 and there is no laceration of the main roots, which, 

 hy Sir Henry's plan, cannot altogether be avoided, 

 this laceration being much more pernicious, and 

 likely to occasion putrescency, than simple cross sec- 

 tion 



By the above sledging practice, we have success- 

 fidly removed fruit trees 2i feet in circumference, at 

 two feet from the ground, and have had some 20 

 feet high, make a new addition to their height of six 

 inches the first summer, where no shortening of the 

 top had taken place. We have also plucked fair 

 loads of fruit, both first and second season, as large 



* We think Sir Henry would find some of the failures of which 

 he owns he cannot well ascertain the cause, but occurring espe- 

 cially in beech and oak, to be owing to a number of the lower 

 roots, which are by far the tenderest, being bruised by the weight 

 of the tree itself, when he turns it repeatedly over from the one 

 side to the other, in order, by throwing in earth beneath it, to 

 raise the root on a level with the surface of the field, the whole 

 weight of the incumbent mass resting upon these soft roots. The 

 oak, and still more the beech, are exceedingly susceptible to in- 

 jury from cutting or bruises, and die far inward from the lacera- 

 tion. The wounded lower roots, especially when any vacuity is 

 left not filled close in with earth, where mouldiness might gene- 

 rate in a dry situation, or when soaking in moisture for a part of 

 the season, will become corrupted; the putrefaction thence gradu- 

 ally extending upward into the bulb, will contaminate the whole, 

 and the second or third year after planting, the tree will be dead. 



Q 



