CHAP. VII.J 
FIG-TREES. 
211 
tinually throwing out fresh spurs from their 
extremities, it is a maxim with gardeners 
never to shorten the bearing branches of a 
cherry-tree. The morello is, however, an 
exception to this rule, as its mode of bearing 
resembles that of the peach; and it is always 
pruned and trained like that tree. The 
cherry-trees grown against walls are the 
different varieties of May Duke, Circassian, 
the large black Tartarian, the Morello, and 
the Bigarreau. Cherries need not be more 
than fifteen feet apart for the common kinds, 
and twenty feet for the morello. 
Fig-trees grow and bear quite well in the 
neighbourhood of London, and they even 
thrive and bear in many street-gardens in the 
City. The fig requires less care in training 
and pruning than any other tree; it should 
indeed rarely be touched with the knife, and 
only the ill placed shoots removed by dis¬ 
budding. The fruit is produced on the 
young wood at the extremity of the branches, 
but it does not ripen till the wood on which 
it grows is a year old. The best soil for figs 
is a light fresh loam not above a foot or 
fifteen inches deep, on a hard, well-drained 
p 2 
