The Crab. 



something more delightful than almost any thing else ac- 

 cessible to our senses. 



205. But, as a Hedge, the Crab is too rugged ; its wood 

 becomes quickly too big ; there come openings at the bot- 

 tom, and the fence is not effectual for many of its purposes. 

 But if a Crab-plant were put in a Hawthorn hedge, along 

 with the Hawthorn-plants, and at every twenty or thirty 

 feet distance, and trained up to a single stem, and then 

 left to get a head, the bottom part of which should be about 

 two feet clear of the top of the hedge, the Crabs would not 

 injure the hedge, and would produce a very charming effect. 



206. The SEED of the Crab is precisely like that of the 

 Apple ; and I am sure the reader has eaten too many apples 

 not to know what sort of things they are. To get these 

 seeds in order to sow them, you have nothing to do but to 

 take the pommice from the press where verjuice has been 

 made, or to gather up the crabs themselves when they 

 have dropped from the tree, mash them to pieces by some 

 means or other, and sow them, pommice and all, in just 

 the same manner as directed for the sowing of the Ash. 

 This work may be done in November, or at any time be- 

 tween that or the end of March. 



207. The management in the seed-beds, and all the sub- 

 sequent operations, including that of planting out, are just 

 the same as those pointed out for the Ash. The plants ought 

 to be cut down the year after planting ; and if you want them 

 to go up with a single stem, they ought to be pruned in 

 the manner directed in paragraph 149. 



208. There is an American Crab, the fruit of which 

 would pass for a winter-apple in England; the leaf of 



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