I. 4. THE LARCH. 95 



able for that purpose, and for little else, were immediately to be 

 planted with larch. In half that space of time, the thinnings 

 of the forest wonld furnish the smaller timber in abundance. 

 It may safely be predicted, that if measures are not taken to 

 restore or preserve our forests, if the same waste goes on, which 

 has gone on for the last fifty years, in seventy years' timber of 

 every kind will be as rare and as dear in New England as it 

 now is in Scotland. 



On the continent of Europe, the larch is put to a great variety 

 of uses. It is considered the best of the woods, both for the 

 carpenter and the joiner ; casks are made of it, nearly incor- 

 ruptible; water-pipes, shingles, vine-props. Its excellent pro- 

 perties for ship-building, as enumerated by Pontey, are its 

 freedom from knots, its durability, its little liability to shrink; 

 or to crack ; its toughness ; its beautiful color and its capability 

 to receive polish ; its incorruptibility, when exposed to alter- 

 nations of moisture and dryness. 



The soils suitable for the larch, according to Matthew,* are 

 sound rock, with a covering of loam, particularly when the rock 

 is jagged or cleft; gravel, not ferruginous, in which water does 

 not stagnate, even though nearly bare of vegetable mould ; 

 firm, dry clays, and sound, brown loam ; all very rough ground, 

 particularly ravines. The most desirable situation is, where 

 the roots will neither be drowned by stagnant water in winter, 

 nor parched by drought in summer.f 



The magnificent cedar of Lebanon, (Cedrus Llbana,) resem- 

 bles the larch more than it does any other of our pines ; differ- 

 ing in having its leaves, which are arranged in the same man- 

 ner, evergreen, and in the greater size of its cones and its broad, 

 spreading top. It is successfully cultivated as an ornamental 

 tree in every part of Great Britain and in France, and would 

 doubtless succeed in New England. 



* As quoted by Loudon, p. 2376. 



f A very valuable account of every thing relating to the whole cultivation, 

 management and uses of the larch, is found in Loudon's Arboretum, pp. 2353 to 

 2399. 



