In the Highlands of Scotland the south and southeast aspects alone can be appropriated to Nectarines with any chance of success.

Propagation of Peaches and Nectarines.

Peaches and Nectarines are propagated by budding them upon the Muscle and the Pear-plum stock; the latter being made use of for those kinds which are among nurserymen termed French Peaches, and which, generally speaking, are by far the best in our collections. Those budded upon the Pear-plum have likewise an advantage over many of the others which are budded upon the Muscle, in being much less affected by mildew, particularly those kinds which have glandular leaves.

The Brompton Stock has also been introduced, and many thousands of peaches and nectarines have been budded upon it, to the serious injury of every one who has purchased them. What has been said upon this subject, when treating of apricots, will, I trust, be suf ficient to warn all persons from purchasing trees, whatever their appearance may be, unless they have been propagated upon either the Muscle or the Pear-plum. — These are the stocks on which we can place a firm reliance for the production of sound trees: the other ought to be banished from every nursery in the kingdom.

In budding peaches and nectarines for dwarfs, good clean stocks should be chosen, and if Muscles, they should be worked the first summer after they have been quartered out as the maiden plants thus raised seldom exceed two inches in circumference, and if not so much the plants will be the better.

The Pear-plum need not be budded till the second summer after quartering, as it seldom acquires a sufficient thickness the first year.

When standards are wanted, the best way is to select the strongest stocks, planting them on good and wellprepared ground by themselves, and when they have stood two years, cutting them down in the month of February close to the ground. As they grow up in the spring, the young shoot should be singled off to one, leaving the best, and shortening the lateral shoots in the summer, to about six inches as they are produced. If the plants grow well, and are properly attended to, they will the first year attain a height of at least six feet: they may the next summer be budded standard high, and the stems will be clean, straight, and handsome.

In planting out trees for training, young plants, or those called maiden plants, should be made choice of for the purpose, being far preferable to those which have been headed down, and stood two years in the quarters of the nursery observing in all cases, without exception, that the bud should stand outwards, and the wounded part where the stock has been headed down, inwards, or next the wall. By this means the wound will readily and effectually heal over, while if otherwise exposed to the sun, it would crack and injure the stock, thus rendering the tree frequently unsound.

When the plants are headed down, care must be taken also that the cut is made at the back, leaving the wound facing the wall, and in all subsequent prunings the wounds should be concealed in the same manner.

Where the branches are horizontal, or where they are trained in a diagonal direction, the cuts may be either at the back, or underneath, facing the ground, so that they be not visible to a person standing in front of the tree. When this method of pruning is pursued without deviation, and the trees properly trained, the wounds will not only be excluded from the action of the sun's rays, but the trees will have a neat and workmanlike appearance.

Pruning and Training of Peaches and Nectarines.

When the young plant of either Peach or Nectarine is removed from the nursery to the place of its destination, it must be headed down at the proper time, in the manner directed under the head of Propagation, and its treatment in all respects must be like that of the Apricot, both in its pruning and training, till the head is completely furnished. One principal object in the management of the Peach, must be to keep up a constant succession of young wood in every part of the tree, for unless this be accomplished the crop of fruit must be partial and defective.

To effect this, the annual shortening of the young wood is perfectly calculated; but the manner in which this ought to be performed has by no means been fixed upon one certain principle: the various methods laid down and insisted upon by writers being greatly at variance with each other, they leave the inexperienced gardener in a dilemma as to which course he should pursue. Some of these are so barbarous and absurd, that it has always appeared to me an act of folly in any one making the attempt to copy them.

A few of these have been exhibited in the Horticultural Garden at Chiswick, in contrast to some very excellent specimens in that department. This, on a small scale, has no doubt been of advantage; because the authors of those fantastical trees have been pointed out at the time of their exhibition, which has in some cases, no doubt, served as a stumbling-block for others to avoid, whilst the trees under a judicious mode of management have held out examples worthy of imitation.

As I have observed before, the principal object to be kept in view is a constant succession of young wood throughout every part of the tree: this is to be effected

by pruning alone, and a judicious distribution of its young wood.

Commencing with the winter pruning, the first rule to be laid down as a basis for all the rest, is to shorten every shoot in proportion to its strength, and to prune to where the wood is firm and well ripened: this will cause all the pithy and unripened wood to be removed, thence causing a supply of that which is better ripened for the ensuing year. But in order to give every facility to the ripening of this wood, it must be trained thin, not in profusion according to the general custom, but such shoots only as may be required for the following

year.

Trees which have arrived at a bearing state should have their strongest bearing shoots shortened to twelve or fourteen inches, those next in strength to eight or ten, and the weaker ones to four or six inches, pruning each to what is termed a treble eye, or that where there is a blossom bud on each side of wood bud: where branches are not in a bearing state, these treble eyes will not be found; they must therefore be pruned to a wood bud alone, which is always known by its sharp point.

When the tree has been pruned once in this manner, the shoots must be trained neatly, nearly parallel to each other, so that a line continued in that direction would lead itself clearly out to the extremity of the tree.

In May, the season for disbudding the tree, all foreright shoots, as well as those from the back, must be carefully removed with a sharp small bladed knife, taking care to cut close to the branch, but not into the bark a few, however, of these foreright shoots had better be cut within a quarter of an inch only, which will leave two or three leaves to each, to shade the young fruit, and such slight wounds in the branch as have been occasioned by cutting the shoots off close.

As soon as the young shoots have grown long enough,

the leading one from each branch should be nailed neatly to the wall, selecting one or two of the side shoots produced lower down the branch, and training them parallel also. This applies to those of the stronger branches, at and near the extremity of the tree. Those

in the middle and near the bottom, will allow of but one shoot probably in addition to the leaders; this will depend upon the space left in the winter pruning; if sufficient, it is always better to have a young shoot on each side as well as the leader, than to have only one, for it is by this arrangement that a succession of young wood can be kept up throughout every part of the

tree.

Should young shoots, indicating extraordinary vigour, any where make their appearance, they should immediately be cut out, unless where a vacant part of the wall can be filled up, because an excess of vigour in one part of the tree cannot be supported without detriment to the other. Peach trees, when in a state of health and vigour, generally throw out laterals from their stronger shoots; when this is the case, they should not be cut off close, but shortened to the last eye nearest the branch; and if there is room, one or two of those first produced may be nailed to the wall; or the middle shoot may be cut out, leaving the two lowest laterals, and allowing them to take its place; thus frequently obtaining two fruit-bearing branches, when the former one would in all probability have been wholly unproductive of fruit the following year.

In the training of Peaches and Nectarines, I wish it to be particularly understood, that I am a decided enemy to that negligent custom of leaving more shoots in the summer than is well known can be wanted for another year, and the still more slovenly custom of "running them in," as it is called, by small pieces of stick extending across the branches, "to prevent their