The last variety is of a fine purple colour when dressed; is more juicy and less harsh, and much better for marmalade, than either of the others. It is the only sort now cultivated in England for domestic purposes.

Propagation.

The Quince is propagated by layers at any time. during the winter months. When the young shoots are laid down, there should not be more than two eyes left above ground, and when those have grown five or six inches long, one of them should be cut clean off, leaving the other to form the plant, which by the autumn will be three feet high.

The layers must be taken off the stools as soon as the leaves are fallen, and planted out in rows at three feet apart from row to row, and ten or twelve inches from plant to plant in the row. At the end of one or two years they will be fit to bud or graft with the different sorts of Pear, for quenouille or for espalier training; or they may be allowed to grow up and form standards for orchard planting.

Those, however, which are intended for budding or grafting, should be shortened to eighteen inches, as soon as quartered out in the rows, which will keep them upright, firm, and steady; but those intended for standards should be staked and tied up as soon as planted, and at the end of three years they ought to be fit to be planted out where they are intended to remain.

Cultivation.

The Quince is cultivated in no other way in this country than as an open standard. Its management is the same as that of the Plum.

The Quince may very safely be planted out in the orchard, without any fear of its degenerating either the

Apple or the Pear, an idea entertained both by Miller and Forsyth; which see, under the head of MEdlar,

There are, no doubt, many other sorts besides the above to be found in different parts of England, and possessing different degrees of merit; those already enumerated are, however, amply sufficient for every useful purpose.

Cultivation.

The propagation of Raspberries is so well known to every gardener to be by suckers, that nothing need be said under this head; but the raising of a new plantation of stools is not by every one accomplished in the shortest space of time, and a collection is scarcely ever arranged so as to give all the sorts of which it may consist an equal advantage. In order to this, it is necessary that the respective heights should be known, to which the different varieties attain. This will enable the planter to arrange them to the greatest advantage.

This will be by placing the tallest growers at the back, the middle growers next, and the shortest growers in front. By this mode of arrangement, the shorter and middle growers will receive their due proportion of sun, without being interrupted by those which attain the greatest degree of elevation. The necessity of such an arrangement as this must be obvious to those who are aware of the advantage to be derived, in wet and cloudy seasons, in having this delicate and tender fruit fully exposed to the sun, and receiving a free and plentiful admission of air.

In making such a plantation as this, it will be advisable, if possible, to have the rows extend from east to west. These should be four feet at least from each other; and supposing one row only can be allotted to each sort, and that six rows are to form the extent of the plantation, then the first or north row may be planted with the Cornish, No. 9.; the second with Woodward's Red Globe, No. 22.; the third with Red Antwerp, No. 3.; the fourth with Yellow Antwerp, No. 4.; the fifth with Cane, No. 6, 7, or 8.; the sixth with Double Bearing, No. 10. or 11.

The stools in the first and second row should be four

feet apart; those in the third and fourth, three feet and a half; and those in fifth and sixth, three feet. In planting, young suckers should be made choice of; and if in plenty, three of these should be allowed to each stool, placing them in a triangle of six inches apart. If fruit are not wanted the first year, the plants will gain considerable strength by being cut down within six inches of the ground as soon as planted, instead of leaving them three or four feet high in order to obtain from them a crop of fruit.

In selecting the sorts for the above six rows, it is intended only to show their arrangement as far as regards their relative heights, not as a proper proportion of each; because a single row of yellow-fruited will not, by many, be deemed sufficient for five rows of red.

When a larger collection is intended to be planted out, the additional varieties may readily be placed so as to correspond with those which I have selected as a specimen.

After the stools are established, and fruit of the largest size acquired, care must be taken to select the strongest canes, and a few of these only from each plant, in proportion to its strength, shortening each to about four-fifths of its original height: these should be supported singly by a small stake to each. For general purposes stakes are unnecessary, as three, four, five, or six canes from the same stool may be tied together on their tip-ends: this may be done so as to give each cane a bow-like direction, which will give much more room for their laterals to grow than if tied up in a more perpendicular manner.

As a succession of this very favourite fruit must always be desirable in the dessert, it may be prolonged considerably beyond its usual time by cutting down some of the stools wholly to within a few inches of the

ground, instead of leaving the canes at four fifths of their length.

This operation may be practised upon both the Red and the Yellow Antwerp, as well as upon several of the other varieties, from which good crops of fruit may be obtained in August.

The double-bearing varieties should have every alternate stool cut down annually: these will furnish an abundance of fruit so late as September, and in a fine warm autumn even to a later period.

As the finest and best of these fruits are, in all cases, the produce of strong and well-ripened canes, it becomes necessary that the stools should have every advantage afforded them. This may be readily effected by causing all the former year's canes to be cut down to the ground as soon as they have produced their crop, instead of allowing them to stand till the winter or spring: this removes an unnecessary incumbrance, and at a season when sun and air are of infinite importance to the young canes, consequently to the succeeding crop of fruit.

CHAP. XXI.

STRAWBERRIES.

CLASS I. Alpine and Wood Strawberries.

The habits and general character of these are very similar; the principal difference being in the shape of the fruit, which is usually conical in the former, and more globose in the latter. The Alpines produce fruit in the autumn, which the Wood Strawberries do Hort. Trans. Vol. vi. p. 149. 1. RED ALPINE.

not.

Fraisier des Alpes.

Hort. Soc. Cat. No. 89.
Duhamel, No. 7. t. 2.

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