ROOT-PRUNING- AND REMOVING. 



49 



trees, and of growing them as pyramidal trees and 

 bashes. 



1st. Their eligibility for small gardens, even the 

 smallest. 



2dly. The facility of thinning the blossom-buds, 

 and in some varieties, such as Gansel's Bergamot and 

 other shy-bearing sorts, of setting the blossoms, and 

 of thinning and gathering the fruit. 



3dly. Their making the gardener independent of 

 the natural soil of his garden, as a few barrowfuls of 

 rich mold and annual manure on the surface will sup- 

 port a tree for many, very many years, thus placing bad 

 soils nearly on a level with those the most favorable. 



4thly. The capability of removing trees of fifteen 

 or twenty years' growth with as much facility as fur- 

 niture. To tenants, this will, indeed, be a boon, for 

 perhaps one of the greatest annoyances a tenant is 

 subject to, is that of being obliged to leave behind him 

 trees that he has nurtured with the utmost care. 



My gray hairs tell me that I am not a young gar- 

 dener, and yet I feel that in judicious root-pruning 

 and annual manuring on the surface, so as to keep our 

 fruit trees full of short, well-ripened fruitful shoots, we 

 are all inexperienced. At this moment I am remind- 

 ed of a wall in a neighboring garden covered with 

 peach and nectarine trees in the finest possible health. 



For more than twenty years a healthy peach tree 

 was never seen in this garden, as the subsoil is a cold 

 white clay, full of chalk-stones. This happy change 

 has been brought about by biennially pruning the 

 roots of the trees early in autumn, as soon as the fruit 

 is gathered ; in some cases lifting the trees and sup- 



