464 
pliny's fattteal histoet. 
[Book XVir. 
change of scene, or that, on leaving the spots of their original 
growth, or to which they have been transplanted, they lay 
aside their bad qualities and become tame, like the wild ani- 
mals, the moment they are separated from the parent stock. 
CHAP. 13. PKOPAOATION BY SLIPS AND CUTTmGS. 
I^'ature has also discovered another method, which is very 
similar to the last — for slips torn away from the tree will live. 
In adopting this plan, care should be taken to pull out the 
haunch^''' of the slip where it adheres to the stock, and so re- 
move with it a portion of the fibrous body of the parent tree. 
It is in this way that the pomegranate, the hazel, the apple, 
the sorb, the medlar, the ash, the fig, and more particularly 
the vine, are propagated. The quince, however, if planted in 
this way will degenerate,^^ and it has been consequently found 
a better plan to cut slips and plant them : a method which 
was at first adopted for making hedges, with the elder, the 
quince, and the bramble, but came afterwards to be applied to 
cultivated trees, such as the poplar, the alder, and the willow, 
which last will grow if even the slip is planted upside down.^^ 
In the case of cuttings, they are planted at once in the spot 
which it is intended they should occupy : but before we pass 
on to the other methods of propagation, it seems as w^ell to 
mention the care that should be expended upon making seed- 
plots.^^ 
CHAP. 14. SEED-PLOTS. 
In laying out a seed-plot it is necessary that a soil of the 
very highest quality should be selected ; for it is very often 
requisite that a nurse should be provided for the young plants, 
who is more ready to humour them than their parent soil. The 
ground should therefore be both dry and nutritious, well 
37 " Perna.'' This method of reproduction is still adopted, but it is not 
to be recommended, as the young tree, before it throws out a root, is liable 
to be overthrown by high winds. Virgil mentions it, Georg. ii. 23. 
38 Palladius only says that the growth of the quince in such case i& very 
slow. 
33 This experiment has been tried for curiosity's sake, and has succeeded ; 
the roots become dry, lose their fibres, and then develop buds, from which 
branches issue ; while the buds of the summit become changed into roots. 
*o " Seminarii " nurseries," as they are more commonly called. 
