The influence of the graft on the stock is seldom referred to in our horticultural works.

Downing says: "The influence of the graft on the stock seems scarcely to extend beyond the power of communicating disease." But if we have discovered this much, it proves that there is an influence, and if it is sufficiently potent to " communicate disease," then it should also be powerful enough to impart other characteristics as well. Mr. J. J. Thomas, in his "American Fruit Culturist," edition of 1849, makes a few remarks upon this point, which I think are worthy of notice. He says: "The extension of the wood of the stock by successive depositions from the leaves of the graft and through the cellular system of the bark, so as to preserve the strict specific identity of the wood of the former, is familiar to every practical cultivator. The same seedling cherry stocks, grafted with sorts of different degrees of vigor, soon vary in amount and size of the fibrous roots. Trees of the Imperial Gage and Jefferson Plum, a few feet in height, when budded on the wild plum, were found to have only half the amount of roots possessed by the unbudded stock of the same age".

Every nurseryman must have observed that some varieties of the pear have far more fibrous roots than others. So marked is the difference, that the common laborers in the nursery soon learn to distinguish them, and will proceed quite differently in digging the trees of each variety, knowing that one has few long, naked roots, while others have short and numerous fibrous ones. These various forms of roots can not be satisfactorily accounted for in any other way but to ascribe the cause to the influ-once of the graft. If we take a seedling apple-tree of one or two years old and divide the root into two sections, upon one of which we insert a cion of the Newtown Pippin and on the other one of the Northern Spy, and then plant them both in exactly the same soil and cultivate alike, when, after three or four years, we dig them up, the roots will have a decidedly different appearance. Still, with all the influence which the cion has had upon the roots, changing their appearance and form of growth, if cuttings are taken from these wots and allowed to grow up into trees and bear fruit, they will produce the same sort in both instances. The vigorous growth of root depends as much upon the stems and branches as the latter does upon the root.

If we graft a weak-growing variety upon a strong, vigorous one, there is no certainty that the stock will be able to overpower the inherent feebleness of the cion and keep it growing vigorously for any considerable length of time. The cause of this, in many instances, is probably owing to the fact, that the leaves on the graft are not capable of assimilating the sap as rapidly as is requisite for the health and growth of the entire plant. Roots gather the crude materials which make up the bulk of the plant from the soil, but they can not grow unless the leaves return to them the requisite materials for their extension. Now, if the leaves are not capable of assimilating all the materials that the roots have the power of absorbing from the soil, it must be apparent that there will be at least a partial check to the circulation of sap, consequently a diminution of growth. A few years since I had an opportunity of witnessing a singular effect of leaves on growth. An old Easter Beurre pear had been allowed to over-bear, and, consequently, had become very much enfeebled in growth, so much so that it did not make an inch of growth upon any one of its branches. One of the small branches was cut off and a cion from a Vicar of Winkfield placed upon it.

The graft made a growth of two feet the first season; the next season the graft not only continued its rapid growth, but the entire tree appeared to revive and send out new and vigorous shoots. My theory in this case may not be a correct one, but I believe that the cause of this change in the old tree was owing to the demand which the new graft made upon the roots for plant-food; they, in return, received materials for their extension. The supply which was gathered and sent forward not being all absorbed by the graft, was forced into the old branches, increasing the size of their leaves, thereby causing a reaction in the entire tree. Healthy leaves indicate healthy growth, and new leaves cause the production of new roots, and these in return furnish the materials for continued growth, and thus a reciprocal action is constantly going on between root and branches.