A STROLL THROUGH THE GARDEN APRIL. 
151 
an inch, will go rapidly to flower. The fruit- 
garden exhibits early signs of plenty ; the 
fruit-buds and flowers completely cover the 
trees, and everything is promising ; but there 
is little doing. Covering the walls against 
frost, is resorted to a little in March ; but 
there is a great difference of opinion as to its 
efficacy. There has been some grafting done 
on a few old trees, I observe ; but I shall ex- 
plain that to you at home. 
I promised to explain grafting to you. It 
is by grafting and budding that we multiply a 
good fruit, for by splicing a small branch of 
a good fruit tree on a growing plant of a wild 
and worthless stock or tree of the same family, 
we make a new tree of the sort we require. 
The stock, or wild tree, does not in the least 
affect the piece we graft on it, for it merely 
finds the nourishment. Suppose you wanted 
to splice a bit of wood on your walking-stick 
or your fishing-rod, to make it longer: you 
would cut a slope on the stick, and another 
slope on the piece you want to join to it, and 
make them fit neatly, — would you not ? Well, 
do exactly the same by the graft and the 
stock, only, instead of binding it so hard as 
you would your stick, merely tie it firm to 
prevent its slipping, and surround the join 
with clay or cement to keep the air from 
drying the sap ; and the graft will have this 
advantage over your stick, that the sap which 
rises from the stock will feed the graft, and it 
will join as firmly as if it had been a part of 
the original ; whereas, if your stick was 
bound up for several years, it would come 
apart when you took off the binding. 
If the weather prove dry to-morrow, we 
will pay some attention to minor operations 
which are going on in the flower-garden. 
For instance, you saw a quantity of large 
empty pots standing in the frame-ground. 
These are for potting the carnations and 
picotees. They will be filled with one-fourth 
or nearly of potsherds or crocks at the 
bottom. This is to secure good drainage. 
Next, a quantity of the compost mixed on 
purpose, and consisting of two-thirds loam 
from rotted turves, and one-third decomposed 
dung from an old melon-bed, or cow-dung 
rotted into mould. The pot in which the 
plants have been wintered, will only require 
tapping against the potting bench, wrong 
way upwards, and the ball of earth will come 
away whole. This may be so adjusted in the 
half-filled pot as that the collar of the plant 
may be even with the surface, and the earth 
should be pressed in round the ball. By 
placing of the carnations and picotees in 
those large pots, which are what the gardeners 
call twelves, they will bloom admirably. 
If we take a walk round to-morrow, we shall 
see the men potting them. I did not go all 
over the kitchen-garden, because the men at 
a distance were only repeating the operations 
we have already seen. Nevertheless, the 
sowing of peas and beans, onions, radishes, 
and salad herbs, is as necessary this month 
as last. So, indeed, is the planting of pota- 
toes ; but we have had enough for this day. 
The frost this morning is not very sharp, 
but it is sufficiently severe to show how neces- 
sary it was to cover up everything tender. 
The pansies look damaged, but that is only 
the injury of the blooms already expanded ; 
and all the frames being matted over, there is 
no harm there. You observe now the men 
potting the carnations and picotees in the 
way 1 described. The youth whom you see 
at the long bed of ranunculuses is top-dress- 
ing with decomposed dung from an old melon 
frame, the earth having been loosened yester- 
day, and the lumps all bruised, for the purpose 
of getting it close up at the roots of the 
plants. Yonder, you observe the gardener 
removing some shrub ; this is not done be- 
cause it is proper, but because it is necessary. 
He is now obliged to be careful, and take up 
every fibre with the plant, otherwise it would 
scarcely recover the removal. The gardener 
is either supplying some deficiency, or making 
some new arrangement by order. He could 
not have delayed anything of the kind to this 
late period, had he known it was to be done 
earlier. The auriculas are sending up their 
blooms fast. The man who is examining 
them is cutting out some of the pips, where 
there are more than the plant can do justice 
to. Where you see him tucking little bits of 
cotton in between the pips, it is for the purpose 
of preventing them injuring one another. 
By means of this wadding, he can place every 
bud in a position to open well without damag- 
ing the others. He takes those that are for- 
ward enough for this from the frame to 
yonder shady place, and covers these with a 
hand-glass. He will have to watch them 
daily to adjust their opening flowers. The 
polyanthuses on the border are very wet, for 
they require abundance of water, and the sun 
has in one short hour taken all the frost out 
of the ground, which now seems as if it had 
been rained on. Those pots full of cuttings 
will have to supply the clumps and borders 
with plants. You see there are verbenas, 
petunias, hydrangeas, heliotropes, scarlet ge- 
raniums, China roses, and several other sub- 
jects, intended for the beds and borders. They 
are only cuttings, and are placed under the 
glasses in these pots to strike root. Another 
man is picking off all the dead and yellow 
leaves from the plants in the frame ; and see 
how carefully he throws those decaying leaves 
