growers use Oldenburg as stock, and there are other
good kinds.

From the young stock, the old head is to be removed and a new head
(the new variety) grown in its stead. The tree, therefore, will be
combined of three kinds of apple,--the root of unknown quality; the
trunk or body under a varietal name; the top, of the variety desired.
Any number of different kinds of apple wood may be worked into the
tree if the tree is large enough. If the operations are well performed
so that there are no imperfect unions, and if the pruning is
judicious, the tree may be grafted many times, in whole or in part.

I have said that my father brought apple seeds from New England and
that the resulting seedlings were top-grafted. One of these trees was
early top-worked to "Holland Pippin," which seldom bore. It stood in
the yard near the smoke-house, where it found abundant nourishment. It
grew to great size. In time I became a grafter of trees for the
neighborhood, and often as I returned at night would have cions of
different kinds in my pockets. It became a pastime to graft these
cions in the old tree. More than thirty varieties were placed there.
It was with keen anticipation, as the years came, that I looked for
the annual crop, to see what strange inhabitants would appear in the
great tree-top. I do not remember how many of these varieties came
into bearing before the tree was finally gathered to the wood-box, but
they were a goodly number, probably more than a score. I used often to
wonder how it was that the nutrients taken in by the roots of the
Vermont seedling and transported in the tissues of the Holland Pippin,
combined with the same air, could produce so many diverse apples and
even pears (for I had pears in that tree) each with the marks and
flavor proper to its kind. The little cions I grafted into the tree
were soon lost in the overgrowth, and yet all the branches that came
from them carried the genius of one single variety and of none other.
And I often speculated whether there were any reflex action of these
many varieties on the root, demanding a certain kind of service from
it.

The cions (sometimes still called "grafts") are cut in winter or early
spring, when well matured and perfectly dormant. Placed in sand in a
cool cellar so they will not shrivel, they are kept until grafting
time, which is early spring, usually before the leaves start on the
stock. The cions may be placed on the tree by several methods, but