38 



GLEANINGS ON HORTICULTUUE. 



any before ; but i*ecollect, as I have before remarked, this must 

 be done with the utmost caution. With young trees, it will 

 answer invariably ; but, from experience, I am convinced that a 

 tree advanced in years had better be removed and a young one 

 planted in its room ; for it is only a loss of time to endeavour to 

 renovate old trees, more especially peach-trees. 



ON THE CULTIVATION OF MELONS, &C. 



An ordinary dung-frame, or brick-pit, should be covered with 

 unfermentable materials beneath each hillock ; the bed for 

 March should be about three feet six inches high at the back ; 

 but three feet, or even less, will suffice, during the remainder of 

 the season. Tree leaves should by all means be mingled libe- 

 rally with the dung, in proportion of one-half at least. As soon 

 as the bed is built, linings of long litter should be placed around 

 it, to promote speedy fermentation, and in about one week the 

 bed will have become very hot — hotter, indeed, than at any 

 period afterwards; and now, the temporary lining may be in 

 part drawn aside, and the bed must receive a thorough watering, 

 usina: a double amount of water alono; the centre. 



Preparation for the mounds of soil may now proceed, and each 

 centre should be hollowed out a foot deeper than the rest of the 

 bed — for melons love depth of soil ; and with this precaution it 

 is impossible they should burn. 



With one foot below the level, and about fifteen inches above, 

 the soil will be two feet deep in the centre, shelving off to about 

 nine inches at the edge of the frame inside. Not that the frame 

 should be soiled over entirely until the plants are becoming 

 established ; it is much safer to start the plants for a week or two 

 at first in the hillocks, leaving a space all around them, and 

 between them and the sides of the frame, of naked fermenting 

 material. The policy of this will be obvious ; for after all the 

 working or fermenting of the dung, some slight amount of noxious 

 gases will remain, or be engendered in the bed; there is no way 

 so ready or so certain to dissipate them as the application of 

 water ; it also assists in raising atmospheric moisture, so necessary 

 to the well-being of the young plant until thoroughly established. 

 Vegetable matter, and also strong loamy soil, are sometimes used, 

 and the success of the melon, as far as the soil is concerned, 

 depends much on the relation the mode of culture bears to the 

 soil in question. Those who use light or vegetable soils lay their 



