362 
There is a remarkable instance of it in peach trees on espa, 
liers. When they are planted in good and new grounds, they 
are for the most part luxuriant and fruitful; while on the 
contrary, those that succeed them become stunted, and 
scarcely bear any thing. This is the case, more or less, with 
all old gardens, it is to be supposed, that this defect arises 
from the species itself. 
As trees are a genus, they contain many species, which, by- 
appropriating to themselves their own suitable support, may- 
come to perfection one after another, in the same manner as 
the different sorts of grain, when varied with judgment, suc¬ 
cessively produce plentiful crops for several years in the same 
field without additional manure. 
“ It is by the adoption of this advantageous practice, (says 
the author of Annotations on the French Georgies), that the 
Flemings, the Brahantese, the Swiss, the Alsatians, and-, 
above all, the English, have raised their agriculture to a de¬ 
gree of perfection unknown to the rest of Europe; that they 
have been able to raise, one after another, on the same soil, 
and always with success, a great number of vegetables of dif¬ 
ferent species and natures, and have established a course of 
props as th.e basis of rural economy.” 
It follows then, that peach trees may very properly replace 
each other, provided the one has been budded on the plum tree, 
and the oilier on the almond, or vice versa ; because it is the stock, 
on which the graft has been intrusted, which sucks up from 
the earth the juices with which it supports it. Peach trees 
may be grafted upon each other, or on the apricot, the plum, 
or the almond ; the latter two are generally preferred, princi¬ 
pally, I think, because they are stronger : the English choose 
the plum, and the French the almond. The inequality be¬ 
tween them, is, in all probability, not very striking, unless it 
be owing to the climate; a consideration, which, in this in¬ 
termediate country, cannot have much weight. It is also 
well known, that the plum tree throws out lateral roots, and 
that the almond is top-rooted; and thus, when the soil is ex¬ 
hausted for the former, it is in some measure new for the lat¬ 
ter. B^planting the almond after the plum tree in the place 
intended for the peach, it will establish a still more decided 
difference in the relative characteristic of the roots of the two 
stocks. The almond, which has not been transplanted, will 
then shoot its roots deeper, and a luxuriant vegetation will 
lay the foundations of a future plentiful produce. 
The almond, when budded in the month of August, or 
sometimes later, succeeds better than at an earlier period ; the 
sap being then too abundant, is liable to drown the eye or 
bud; gum is also subject to form itself, and the process is 
vegetable and animal kingdom, as it is by judicious unions in each, that the 
one and the other are procured in the highest perfection. The most flou¬ 
rishing breeds will degenerate, unless care is occasionally taken to cross them 
againi 
surer 
I 
