HAWKERS OF ORNAMENTAL PLANTS. 
389 
slips longitudinally; and the platanus and others ease their swelling 
stems of an useless encumbrance by discharging their oldest bark in 
broad flakes, as is so visible at this season of the year. 
All these instances show that the bark has only a temporary agency 
in the system, and that, in fact, it is only an excrementitious product 
of the plant. In the early stages of its growth it assists in the con¬ 
duction of the sap, and continues so to do for perhaps three or four 
years—longer or shorter, however, according to the specific character of 
the bark itself. The bark of a beech, an orange, or a fig tree, is very 
different from those of the oak, the Dutch elm, or the cork trees; the 
former are thinner, more compact in texture, and remain longer service¬ 
able as active members of the system, than the barks of the latter, which 
are grosser in consistence, and more fugitive. 
Under certain circumstances of soil or situation, the bark of both 
fruit and forest trees is not naturally rent nor distended enough to 
allow of free or perfect growth, and consequently cramps the healthy 
expansion, and causes a stagnation of the juices inimical to the well¬ 
being and fruitfulness of the trees. 
That this defect, to which all trees are liable, admits of a practical 
remedy, has been already shown (see page 416, vol. iv.) ; so that it is 
unnecessary to advert to it again in this place, except to recal attention 
to the fact, and to regret that it is not so generally understood nor so 
much practised as it should be. 
Specimens of cork-trees in this country, though they attain the 
height of thirty or forty feet, would, we are certain, be much benefited 
by having all their old bark stripped off; it would induce a renewed 
vigour, and prompt the hide-bound exotics to acquire greater magnitude 
of bole, and greater extent of branches, and, moi’eover, enlarge the 
foliage; making the trees more ornamental, which old cork-trees very 
seldom are, in consequence of the diminutive size and tarnished appear¬ 
ance of the leaves. 
Other exotic trees having a watery sap, such as some of the American 
oaks, may, no doubt, be much encouraged in growth by paying atten¬ 
tion to the state of their bark, in not suffering it to become injuriously 
hardened and unhealthy. 
Hawkers of Ornamental Plants. —It is astonishing to witness 
what great numbers of poor industrious people gain a livelihood by 
hawking flowering plants in baskets through the streets of London. 
These intermediate dealers keep employed a considerable portion of 
the capital, and a good many of the hands, of the London nurserymen. 
The favourite plants of the basket-retailers are those having the attrac- 
