August 1.] THE COTTAGE 
should remain out until October, when a second portion 
of roots may he cut away, and the trench tilled in. llus 
practice, however, is too unsightly in dress grounds to he 
generally recommended, as the hillocks of soil hero and 
there detract much from the general neatness. 
It is very difficult to convey a just idea of the amount 
of roots necessary to bo removed to persons not accus¬ 
tomed to the practice. We know ot no better plan 
tli an classifying all fruits under tour different sections, 
as to habit, which may stand as follows1st. The 
gross. 2nd. The luxuriant. 3rd. The thriving. 4th. 
The weak. Now it will ho obvious that No. 4 does not 
belong to our present subject; it is a proper case tor a 
rich top dressing, or renewed soil. No. 3 also requires 
little meddling with. We have now to come to^ some 
definition of the terms “ gross and “ luxuriant, than 
which (although, perhaps, not perfectly satisfactory) we 
can find no better terms to express what we would con¬ 
vey. In order, then, to be understood, let us take the 
case of two young peaches—say the Royal George- 
growing side by side on a wall, lhe one had made 
shoots three feet long by midsummer, at which period 
all the coarsest shoots had their points pinched away. 
Since then they have put forth side spray, which has 
been pinched again, and again they are branching as 
fast as ever. This we call a case of grossness. 
And now for subject the 2nd. This had grown also 
nearly a yard up to the same period, and some of tho 
shoots were pinched; instead, however, ol subdividing 
into a profusion of watery spray, they have remained 
stationary, or nearly so. This, then, is a case ot luxuri¬ 
ance. This tree is strong and hearty; tho former is 
what gardeners term “ wild.” 
Any person, indeed, however ill-informed on this sub¬ 
ject, may soon take a few lessons from Natures sell, by 
watching for a few weeks, in the height ot summer, the 
growth of various troes. The indications before alluded 
to will soon become manifest, and a little attention will 
render them familiar as the alphabet. 
And now as to tho distance at which to operate in 
J uly or August root-pruning, l ew fruit trees in kitchen 
gardens, under a training or dwarfing system, extend 
roots of any consequence abovo six teet from tho main 
stem. Here, then, is a safe distance at which to com¬ 
mence operations. We are now speaking ot trees 
nearly or quite full grown. In such cases the luxuriant 
tree may be cut at about this distance, whilst in the 
case of the gross tree about one-third more of tho space 
between this point and the tree stem may be cut. I his 
latter will be a severe operation, and will, indeed, be 
carried to within four feet or so of the stem. 
In the case of young trees, a year or two after plant¬ 
ing, they may generally have a trench opened to within 
half a yard of their stem. The vital forces are so active 
in the latter class, that a severe operation is much 
sooner recovered from than in older trees; and we 
must, therefore, recommend our readers to think of this 
when root-pruning, and to suffer their operations to be 
biassed in some degree by it. 
Some writers on root-pruning advise that the excava¬ 
tion bo filled with rich soil or compost. We do not 
advise this course. It is quite sufficient to iutioduce 
fresh turfy soil, it to spare. R. Lrrington. 
THE FLOWER-GARDEN. 
Propagation by Cuttings. —No one who has ex¬ 
perienced the annoyance ot losing a host of little half- 
starved plants in the winter, and who is at all aware of 
the fact that plants from cuttings made late in the 
autumn are so weak in their constitution that it tiies 
the skill of a good gardener to preserve thorn half alive 
over a long winter,—I say no one who knows all this, or 
1 GARDENER. 273 
even the half of it, will assert that it is too soon now to 
put in all the cuttings which he may require or can 
procure. Hotbeds for cuttings in September, unless 
very slight indeed, are an abomination altogether tor 
amateurs; and those writers who recommend this—the 
largest class of the community—to trust to hotbeds for a 
stock of plants, and say it is time enough to think of 
putting in your cuttings this long while yet, ought them¬ 
selves to be put into these very hotbeds and nailed down 
till they were half stifled and gaping for breath; they 
would then better understand the difficulty of tending 
hotbed-struck plants during the winter, for they would 
probably find out to their cost that after being halt 
smothered themselves in a stinking hotbed, they would 
have little relish, and less ability, to stand against a 
November fog. It is just so with little bits ot sott 
plants that are half stifled in these beds, to get them to 
root late in the autumn. Rut I shall be told ot the 
success that has attended late autumn propagation loi 
years, by Messrs. So-and-so; and I allow it, and 1 can 
vouch for the fact, for in 1840 the first cutting for the 
flower-beds in this place, Shrubland Park, was made on 
the 10th of October; yet the beds were as full and gay 
in 1841 as they were before or since. But then look at 
the machinery that was put in motion to bring up lost 
time,—wholo ranges of hot-pits with linings, hot water 
pipes, and what-not, and a dozen or more men to attond 
to them. But where is an amateur, with only the assist¬ 
ance ho can get from the pages ot a little twopenny 
book like this, that could manage to till one small flower¬ 
bed next year, it he were to put oft his cuttings till next 
October ? No ; amateurs ought to have all the cuttings, 
or rather all the plants they require for “ stock ” next 
spring, struck before the end of August, and that without 
any assistance whatever from hotbeds. Ihen, to inure 
the whole of them to stand out of doors through Sep¬ 
tember, and as far into October as the frost would allow 
of, but to guard them all the time from heavy rains, to 
nip off the points of tho shoots, and at every other joint, 
as fast as they grow, and after “ housing them tor the 
winter to allow them as much air as the state of tho cold 
will permit, and to keep the pots for tho whole winter in 
that happy medium wo call between wot and dry. Let 
any one who doubts the possibility of keeping these soil 
plants alive during a long winter try this plan, and 
begin it immediately, and I am sure he will never putot 
his autumn propagation again till September, or even to 
the middle of August. 
The Anagallis was mentioned as a sample ol what I 
think would be tho safest course to pursue with any 
plants that aro found difficult to manage in winter. By 
keeping over a few plants of such at the time ol planting 
out in May, they are sure to bo strong enough to stand 
rough treatment in winter, where young autumn-struck 
plants of the same kind would bo sure to die before 
Christmas. The Double American Groundsel I instanced 
already as belonging to those tender things, and after 
that one’s own experience, can fill up a goodly list; be¬ 
sides, what one man finds easy to keep another cannot 
keep at all—so that all of us must make our lists from 
our own experience, rather than from printed ones , and 
1 should make it a standing rule that whatevor plant I 
found ticklish to stand the winter with me, should 
henceforth be put on the list of troublesomes, and be 
propagated at the end of spring for storing, instead of in 
the autumn. 
There is a second class of bedding plants wlucli dilior 
in different soils and under different management; the 
Heliotrope will represent this class, which includes all 
thoso plants of which it is difficult to get good cuttings 
in the autumn, or which root unwillingly even it they 
can bo procured. Almost every plant will strike from 
cuttings in the spring, but now tho case is different; 
the shoots aro either too thick and succulent, or they 
