3S4 WISCONSIN STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCEITY. 
THE LEAF. 
While thus advising and practicing the stopping of superfluous 
growth on all vines, by pinching laterals and removing tendrils, 
and, on bearing vines, stopping the shoots, I am no advocate for 
removing the leaves from the shoots. I would as soon expect 
ripe, high-flavored fruit after removing the unripened cluster, as 
by stripping off the leaf opposite the cluster. I give to the leaves 
of the shoots equal care and attention with the fruit. The leaves 
are the laboratories in which the sap is prepared for the nourish¬ 
ment, not only of the fruit, but of the wood ; and without the aid 
and companionship of the former, neither of the latter can ever 
ripen. 
Dr. Lindley, in Theory and Practice of Horticulture, says : 
“ It would he of no use for a plant to suck food out of tlie earth by its 
roots, unless there was some place provided in which such food, consisting 
principally of water and mucilage, could be digested and so converted into 
the matter which maintains the health of the individual. The stem cannot 
do this, because it is a mere channel through which the fluids pass. It is to 
the leaves that this important office is assigned. They have veins through 
wdiich their fluids pass, and cells in which they are held while digesting; 
myriads of little caverns through whose sides respiration is maintained, a 
skin to guard them from the air, and pores for carrying off perspiration. For 
the power which the parts of plants possess of attracting fluids is in propor¬ 
tion to the amount of their perspiration. Now leaves perspire copiously, 
but the grapes themselves scarcely at all; whence their gradual conversion 
from a substance of the texture of a leaf into a mass of pulp. 
“A leaf is, in fact, both stomach and lungs, and of this we may be certain 
that neither taste, perfume, color, size, nor any other property can be given 
to a plant except through the assistance of the leaves. Strip the ripening 
grapes of their green garments, and no color or sweetness will be collected 
in their berries.” 
And yet, Dr. Lindley advocates stopping superfluous growth in 
some eases, and specially instances the vine. He says: 
“ In this plant the fruit is borne near the base of the lateral shoot, which 
will, if unchecked, go on lengthening and producing leaves to a considera¬ 
ble distance. Now, all the food of such a lateral shoot is obtained from the 
main branch, which, however, is only capable of furnishing a certain quan¬ 
tity, If the lateral shoot is allowed to grow until checked, it will consume 
its portion of food in the proportion of many leaves and some grapes; and 
the more there is of the former, the less will be the weight of the latter. But 
