126 



THE FLORIST AND POMOLOGIST. 



If a Vine is so closely covered with glass that the air around it is always 

 saturated with humidity, and if it is then exposed to the sun (the air being 

 always warm), it breaks in the usual way ; but, in a few days, each shoot 

 will produce a lateral from the bottom of every leaf. These laterals, after 

 growing to a certain length, will themselves break into fresh laterals, and so 

 growth goes on. Thus, a Vine in such a situation, having fifty eyes, will form 

 fifty new shoots : these shoots, after a time, will break into at least ten 

 laterals, and each lateral may be expected to produce half a dozen other laterals 

 of a second order. This being so, a single Vine with fifty eyes may be com- 

 pelled to produce materials for three thousand new plants, instead of its power 

 of multiplication being limited to the original fifty eyes, as is the case under 

 ordinary circumstances. 



The process is in most respects similar to that practised in the establish- 

 ment then conducted by Mr. Weeks in the King's Road, where Vines of the 

 old and new varieties were grown extensively. As soon as they have pushed 

 a shoot 1 foot or 15 inches long, it is cut back to near the base, and the top is 

 made into cuttings, every one of which strikes, and thus a great many plants 

 of any particular kind are obtained in one season. The chief point is, to take 

 care to start them sufficiently early to get the young wood strong and well 

 ripened by the autumn. 



In both cases young green wood is employed ; but in the last-mentioned 

 place a shoot is itself divided into cuttings, each having at least a couple of 

 eyes ; and there the operation ends. So that, while in the case above supposed 

 there is a possibility of getting three thousand cuttings in a season by the use 

 of laterals, we could hardly expect more than three hundred by merely dividing 

 the first strong shoots into cuttings. We know not whether these methods are 

 absolutely new ; probably not, for they are such as theory would certainly 

 suggest if brought to bear upon the subject, But they are so far novel, that 

 they have not been generally employed by gardeners. 



We say that they are such as theory would suggest. Nothing is more 

 certain than that the greater and more active the vitality of a cutting, the 

 more freely will it become a new individual by the emission of roots. It is 

 equally certain that vitality is most active in the young shoots of plants, turgid 

 with organisable matter, and abounding in nitrogenous principles : therefore it 

 is a general axiom in theory, that a young cutting will strike more quickly 

 than an old one ; that green wood will root more readily than ripe wood. 

 Propagation by the eyes of the Vine is indeed, in some degree, an evidence of 

 this fact. But ripe or half-ripe wood, though least active, and charged in the 

 smallest degree with organisable and nitrogenous matters, is usually preferred, 

 and for the following reason : — It is indispensable that some time should elapse 

 between planting a cutting and its emission of roots, during which time its 

 vitality must be maintained by artificial means. In many plants this is an 

 operation so difficult, or uncertain, that vitality departs before roots can come, 

 and thus the cutting dies. Wherefore nearly ripe or fully ripe wood is often 

 preferred, becaiise its vitality, although comparatively low, is more easily sup- 

 ported in the absence of roots than if it were younger and more active. 

 Whether or not, therefore, it is desirable to use green, half-ripe, or fully ripe 

 wood for propagation, can only be determined experimentally. In many cases 

 it has been thus determined, and we find one-year-old wood used for some 

 things, two-year-old wood for others (as Oaks and Beeches when grafted), 

 while in some cases the quite green wood is universally employed, to which 

 latter class the Vine may be now referred. 



But is this a good mode of propagating the Vine as well as an easy — that 

 is to say, Will the young plants obtained from green wood be as healthy as if 



