peach trees in the middle of July, the old speckled and hard wood should then be removed by cutting such branches out entirely; the slender and delicate branches should likewise be taken away, and such as are allowed to remain should not be too crowded or too close upon each other, but preserved at proper distances; the centre of the tree should be well cleared of wood, and should there be an abundance of rough and far projecting branches, some of them may likewise be removed, leaving the remainder at proper distances, as they will oftentimes, notwithstanding they appear hard and old, throw out new and strong branches which will bear fruit. As it is of great consequence to have the peach trees of a large size, it is of far more importance to attend to this than to their shape. All long and healthy branches, particularly such as proceed direct from the trunk, should be left to furnish fruit-bearing wood. The branches should never be shortened by lopping off their extremities, but those that are intended to be pruned, whether principal or lateral branches or the side shoots from the latter, or the shoots from these again, ought always to be completely removed; the fourth order of branches

being at a great distance from any nourishment will, in general, be slender and delicate and not worth pruning. Such branches being all strong and perfectly capable of bearing the fruit they may contain, will be better nourished themselves, and will consequently be stronger and give better fruit, no part of the nourishment of the tree being thrown away in the support of useless wood."

Subsequent to this operation peach trees require no other management than the ordinary waterings, until he following October,

when the blossoms begin to appear, and when the roots must be opened. As peach trees sustain little or no injury from having their roots opened when in blossom, provided they be covered up again immediately, I prefer the latter end of October for the process; notwithstanding many of the trees in the garden may be in blossom earlier than others (as it will always be the case when the peach orchard is extensive that the peach trees do not blossom at the same time), it is preferable to wait than to manure and dress such trees as have not dropped nearly the whole of their leaves. These trees blossom at different periods throughout the whole of the months of September and October, and I consider this is the natural season in the Mysore climate; some trees, however (such as are getting old or may be crowded with wood), will blossom irregularly throughout six or seven months of the year, but their fruit will come to nothing. By opening the roots of, and adding manure to, such trees as still retain many of their leaves with a firm and strong hold, and by supplying such trees with the additional quantity of water that this deepening renders necessary, the wood buds are formed to the injury of the tree. To have a successful crop of fruit the blossoms must always make their appearance before the leaves. Old leaves that are withered and easily detached may be removed without any detriment to the trees, and the roots may in such instances be opened. Whenever it may be thought advisable to open the roots it should be performed by taking out the earth to a considerable distance all round each treeand nearly as low as the surface of the roots; the earth in contact with, and amongst, the latter

should be loosened by the handhoe, to facilitate the entire removal of the grass roots, which ought to be taken away from all the earth within this space. Three whed-barrows full of a composition prepared by mixing equal parts of red earth, sheep's dung, and common manure well together, should then be added to every old or fullgrown tree, and in the same proportion to others that are younger, after which the earth may be returned and the trees should be watered. The roots of old and strong peach trees should be exposed to the sun for four, five, or six days, but those of the young ones being more tender ought to be closed up again as speedily as may be convenient. After peach trees have been dressed as above, they should be watered every other day until they have received three waterings to counteract the heat of the sun at this season of the year and prevent its injuring the stem;-but from that time to the conclusion of the first season once every three days will be perfectly sufficient, and afterwards, till the season returns for deeping them again, they will only require a supply of water every five or six days according to the nature and quality of the soil in which

they may be planted. As peaches require nearly four months to mature and ripen, if the trees be deeped in October the ripe fruit may be expected in the following February, when their growth and enlargement will have taken place during the coldest and most favourable time of the year; they commence to ripen at the commencement of the hot season, when the heat will enrich and swell the fruit, and as the season generally continues about two months, it will be completed before the violent storms set in in April. When the trees blossom late and

the fruit does not acquire its full growth before the hot weather has well advanced, the excessive heat of the sun shrivels the peaches. During the fruit season the grass should occasionally be removed from the surface of the earth immediately surrounding the stems of the trees to prevent the small ants from ascending to the peaches, which, when nearly ripe, are injured by these insects and frequently spoiled by them. Peach trees will bear a liberal pruning in the month of July, when they have acquired their annual supply of new wood, and whilst at rest; but if this operation be deferred until the fall of the leaves when the flower-buds are enlarging and forming into blossoms, they must be pruned with great moderation, for if much wood be taken away the tree will be too much forced and will let fall those blossoms to the diminution of the crops of fruit, and remain in a pining and weakly condition for a time, during which many of the branches will probably die or else some of the trees themselves will, which I have known to happen. The same shoots bear fruit once only; these will rather lengthen and furnish buds for fruit in the subsequent year, or else lateral ramifications will be thrown out either from these or from older branches for the same purpose, but the same wood never yields fruit a second time. When peach trees attain six or seven years of age they are apt to cease furnishing new wood annually, and when that failure takes place they cannot yield fruit in the following year; such trees will decline more rapidly every year as they advance in age, each interval of failure to furnish new wood being longer than the preceding one, until they cease to bear fruit altogether.

The first sign of advanced age in, peach trees is the late appearance of the new wood of the season; their branches are crowded together and do not attain the lengths of the younger trees. Having had little experience in the grafting and inoculating of peach trees, I am unable to speak with precision as to the utility of either of the operations; but from the appearance of inoculated and grafted trees which are now in gardens at I am in

clined to entertain no very favourable opinion of either of these operations; they had become stunted and had every experience of old age earlier than the seedling trees. With the exception of

about three years, their supplies of new wood were not so liberal as those of the latter, and they failed earlier in bearing peaches. I conceive, however, that I require greater experience on the subject to entitle this opinion to any consideration. Inoculated peach trees, or such as may be grafted upon stalks of the same fruit, likewise layers or slips, particularly the latter, never grow to the size of seedling trees, which is a natural objection to any of the former modes of propagating, and by preserving a nursery of small trees, such as are either old or yield bad fruit can be replaced by them.

I.

II.

A certain Ex

The great scarcity of game this year in all parts of the Deccan can only be accounted for by the unusually protracted time of the setting in of the last monsoon, which at length came with such violence as to upset the broods, and addle the eggs, of all those that did not bargain for such a season, and wait until the first burst of the rains was over ere they feathered their nest. The fowler, in his range, will daily met with instances to confirm him in this idea -the occasional bevies of half fledged quail, the quantity of eggs of Quail, Partridge, and Florican, found on the ground, in such a manner as to indicate that a second breeding must

DISTEMPER

As this subject appears to be one of interest to some of our subscribers we shall offer no apology for suggesting a remedy which was communicated to us by a canine amateur, and of the efficacy of which we have had "the ocular proof." It is simple in the extreme but as it can only be applied to whelps, it must be considered a preventive, rather than

a cure.

Inoculate Whelps a fortnight old for the Cow Pox in the RooTS OF BOTH EARS, in order to prevent their licking or scratching before the virus has diffused itself.

have taken place throughout the feathered game; together with the number of diseased hares which seem to have suffered equally by unseasonable weather. Even the common grey quail are but scantily sprinkled over the country, and rise in pairs; a Florican is rarely to be met with; wildfowl by no means so numerous as in former seasons, so that a sportsman can scarcely shoot enough to satisfy himself for his trouble in its pursuit. Snipe, however, must be considered an exception to this dearth of game, and are found in great numbers, which is easily explained by their not breeding in this part of the country.-Poonah, Feb., 1829.

IN DOGS.

In evidence of the value and certainty of this proceeding we will mention an interesting fact. A favourite bitch littered nine; seven of these were inoculated and two left untouched. About seven weeks afterwards a Greyhound Pup having the distemper very bad was put into the kennel with them; and in five days the two whelps not inoculated had become infected; one of these died and the other was destroyed after every endeavour to cure him had utterly failed. The seven inoculated pups were not in the slightest degree affected.

man

What's a hundred miles, said I, as I seated myself in that glorious vehicle "A Nibbs," to a who's fond of sport and such noble sport too as tiger-hunting?

Now, to tell the truth, the distance is a mere trifle when comfortably seated with an awning overhead and rattling away at nine miles an hour, but when there's

nothing for it but bump bump along the king's highway on horseback it's no joke.-Ten miles, however, of that work was all I had to bring me into Jattygaum to breakfast on the 15th of January, where I found the rest of the party not only true to the day but on the point of proceeding to mischief; the elephants had already been sent on, and it took us very little time to be on the road too.

A bad commencement often makes a good ending-as true a proverb as any I know-and so it proved to-day. Somehow or other we lost the track of the elephants and galloped for about an hour over the country backwards and forwards, in hopes of getting a view; when after a circumbendibus of some miles we fell in with them at a village within a few hundred yards of which at one time we must have passed.

a

Reasonable expectation of tiger near this place had led us thus far; but on our arrival all looked blank-the bheels had brought in no intelligence, and we had the choice of only two unsatisfactory alternatives-either to sit still under a tree or beat for a tiger ourselves; the latter was chosen, and we mounted our elephants. We had wandered slowly in the most likely direction, when a halloo-one of those screams which thrill through and through a man— attracted us to a small thick jungle on the banks of a ravine within a very short distance of an all but deserted village, to which miserable state the tigress now found had contributed to reduce it, having but lately feasted on the Patell himself, and three others whom she had absolutely carried off out of the middle of their cattle.

A finer country could not be desired; one small ravine with thin cover, with another somewhat

VOL. I.

thicker about fifty yards on one side, comprised the only difficult ground-a minute or two sufficed to make the necessary arrangements, and four elephants bore down in line. The tigress jumped up immediately from a small ravine and made across for the thicker cover at a lobbing canter, rendering the aim too uncertain to fire.

It's a rule, and a very capital one, amongst most tiger hunters, never to fire the first time unless with a dead aim-in other words, a "pot shot." This is so certain to present itself if one goes quietly to work, that unless in certain cases a man does more towards losing than killing his tiger by acting contrary. Even if he should get up under the elephant's feet, he is sure after a very few steps to turn round and stare you in the face; then's your time, and if you can't hit with a "pot shot" like that, you had better go home and practise till you can.

Now, the exception to this rule is with a man-eater; the very taste of human flesh appears to have a wonderful effect on a tiger. I ought, perhaps, to have said tigress, for it almost invariably happens that a man-eater is a female-making him cowardly, sneaking, and mute; he never roars, seldom even when wounded -and never before-charges, and is constantly on the alert, trying every method of avoiding you. With a brute of this kind, shoot when you can. Unlike other tigers, he is just as much frightened and inclined to make off before a shot is fired as after, and consequently, where no harm can be done as to frightening him, the more shots fired the better;-the greater the chance of doing mischief.

The tigress got safe into the thickest cover and lay so close as

X