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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated.1832 Excerpt:... 17 CONVERSATION XVI. ON GRAFTING. MRS. B. We may now proceed to the art of grafting, an operation from which we derive our finest fruits. It consists in placing a portion of one plant in juxtaposition with another, in such a manner that they shall unite and grow together. The branch which is cut from one tree to be transferred to another is called the graft, or scion, and the tree to which it is transferred the stock. CAROLINE. This, then, is not a mode of multiplying plants, but of changing their nature; for if a branch of one plant be added to another plant, the number is not increased. MRS. B. Certainly not. The advantage of grafting consists in improving the quality, not augmenting the number, of plants. The ancients entertained very exaggerated ideas of this art: they conceived that every species of plant might be grafted on each other: but it is now well ascertained that this operation can be performed only on plants of the same family. To ensure the success of a graft, it is necessary that the vessels of the liber of the two plants should meet and correspond, in order that the cambium should descend from the graft into the stock; for it is by the union of the vessels of the bark of both plants that they are soldered, as it were, together. CAROLINE. Then endogenous plants, since they have no bark, cannot be grafted? MRS. B. Several attempts have been made to perform that operation upon them, but hitherto, I believe, they have failed. Indeed it is seldom that grafting succeeds excepting when made on plants of the same family; for some anatomical analogy is requisite in the form, the structure, and dimensions of the vessels, which is only to be met with in plants of the same family. A certain degree of physiological similarity is besides necessary; such...