32 ON THE PICEA NOBILIS, AND ITS VALUE FOR 



and intelligent forester, reports that he has planted P. nohilis 

 in quantity, and that they are making strong annual shoots of 

 from 15 inches to 30 inches ; — the boles showing by their stout- 

 ness near the ground that tlie trees may be expected to become 

 large and heavy timber, and to prove in the locality, within the 

 next fifty years, a great boon for farm buildings and other country 

 constructive purposes. It is in Aberdeenshire thoroughly hardy ; 

 but in some of the light gravelly soils it is rather slow of growth 

 when young. Thus, at Balmoral, we find that, — when introduced 

 along with many other varieties of the eouiferai by the enterpris- 

 ing zeal and arboricultural proclivities of the lamented Prince 

 Consort, whose skill and eye for landscape effect have changed the 

 face of the estate from a sterile, rugged, and uncultivated waste 

 into a demesne of beautiful cultivation and a spot rich in land- 

 scape effect, where the artificial is admirably blended and 

 harmonised with the natural beauty of the scenery, — plants of 

 the P. nohilis planted in 1856 had in January 1878 only attained 

 a height of from 18 to 20 feet. They grew very slowly for some 

 years after being introduced into the light, gravelly soil, and 

 coarse, dry, gravelly subsoil at this elevation (860 feet) ; but now, 

 since they have become established, their young shoots for each 

 of the past three years have been from 15 inches to 20 inches in 

 lengtli. Generally in Aberdeenshire and other counties of Scot- 

 land, much exposed to the easterly and north-easterly winds of 

 spring, all the coniferous family suffer more than on the western 

 and midland counties, so that the success of the F. nohilis in such 

 open exposures warrants the belief in its thorough hardihood. In 

 one respect it has the advantage of never opening its buds in 

 spring so early as to be bitten by the late spring frosts ; and again, 

 its period for producing growth is so brief, that even in a climate 

 like that of Great Britain there is ample time in our short 

 summers for the full development and ripening of tlie season's 

 wood before the winter frosts set in. In the neighbourhood of 

 Keithhall it thrives in low-lying bog-earthy soil at the river (Don) 

 side, and at 50 feet higher up it is again seen luxuriant in loam 

 on a subsoil of hard gravel ; and again, at 200 feet higher still, on 

 a clay loam with subsoil of whin-rock, it is making even better 

 progress and is as hardy as it is in the lower altitudes. One fine 

 specimen blown down in January 1868 at Durris (Kincardine- 

 shire) was then 40 feet in height, although only twenty-eight 

 years planted. Mr Begg, factor to Mr Young of Durris, reports 

 that 8000 young plants had been reared from cones produced by 

 this tree, and that the seedlings have proved quite hardy and 

 healthy. The soil is of a free, open, porous, granitic nature, upon 

 a subsoil of gravelly clay, but porous. In season 1875, Mr Begg 

 infornts us that from 70 cones of P. nohilis he succeeded in raising 

 1000 plants; and in 1876 he gathered 160 fertile cones from the 



