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SELECTED ARTICLES. 
with the principles of radiation, and have little or nothing to 
do with the temperature of the atmospheric medium. If the 
soil is not of a sandy consistence, in that case I would employ 
a thin stratum of sand. I have in my little garden just such 
a surface, inclined and sandy, and have planted vines with an 
intention to train them on the surface, on a frame-work, some- 
thing like cucumbers or melons in a hot-bed. The vine I am 
making my experiments with, is called Miller's black grape. 
I have already had ample proof that the healthy luxuriance of 
other tender plants does not suffer, and that frost has little or 
no effect on such an exposure. 
For the purpose of maturing the fruit, 1 shall throw a veil of 
black gauze over the vines; and this will secure me the effects 
of a powerful absorption of the caloric rays of the sun's beams. 
Though the radiation from a black surface is proportioned to 
its absorbent capacity, it will operate during the lengthened 
day (and at this period of the year the night is reduced to its 
minimum) in the maturation of the fruit, while the sandy sur- 
face is retentive, from its non-conducting character. If 
bunches of grapes on vines exposed sub dio, or reared in the 
open air, be tied up in white bags, they will scarcely ripen, 
are small, and want flavour; but if other bunches on the same 
tree be confined in bags of black crape, the contrast is very 
striking, in the latter being fully ripe, large, and of a flavour 
equal to those cultivated on a foreign soil. This fact explains 
the principle on which I would veil my vines with sable 
weeds; further explanation would, therefore, be superfluous 
and unnecessary. 
Respecting the Chinese method of propagating fruit trees, 
it is merely requisite to detach a strip, or narrow ribband, of 
bark from the branch or limb which is to be separated. The 
Chinese apply to this a ball of earth mingled with clay, to im- 
part greater consistency to it, and this is covered with moss, 
and secured by bandages formed of some pliant material; a 
small pan containing water is suspended over it, and serves to 
keep the ball moist. This method, as successfully pursued in 
