RErOKT ON LARCH FORESTS. 419 



believing that plants from imported seed are not now equal 

 in respect to their endurance of cold to what they once were. 

 I can account for the difference in no other way. As to the 

 existence, however, of a very great difference in hardiness 

 between larch plants from home-grown seed and that grown 

 from seed recently imported, I can speak positively from a prac- 

 tical knowledge of the fact extending over many years. 



A very noticeable instance of the difference between the two 

 sorts appeared in November 1865, at a time when I would have 

 least expected it to be apparent ; for in this district the autumn 

 was excessively warm, and so dry that water became scarce, and 

 I would have expected that weather so ripening in September 

 and throughout October would have assimilated the plants, at 

 least as to appearance for the time, but the case was very 

 different. I had a few plants of both sorts two years old ; they 

 stood in the same seed-bed, sown at the same time in the same 

 quality of soil, and with treatment exactly the same ; yet, at a 

 distance as far as the plants were visible, the difference was 

 quite distinct in colour. Those from home seed had their foliage 

 thoroughly ripened, of a mellow yellow or golden colour all 

 over, with shoots well ripened, and the terminal buds visible, 

 full and plump. Those from foreign seed had their foliage quite 

 green on the extremities of the shoots, and ripened foliage only 

 on the lower portion of the growths, which were soft and succu- 

 lent near' the top, having the terminal buds concealed in the 

 green twist of the foliage, such as is usually seen on the young- 

 larch shoots in the end of September. These symptoms of the 

 want of hardiness may therefore be said to appear on the plants 

 of imported seed even in the best of seasons. 



A person unacquainted with the nature of the plant, and the 

 influence of seasons, would be apt to suppose that if the plants 

 were too tender, the severity of winter would clear the ground of 

 them in early life, so that there would be no chance of their 

 remaining to die by the influence of frost in a more advanced 

 state in the forest ; this, however, is not the case so uniformly 

 as might be expected. Many are severely injured; but plants 

 in nursery lines often renew their tops or leading shoots. Re- 

 moval, by transplanting, into the nursery or into the forest 

 has a tendency to harden the plant, and to sustain it for a short 

 time against the frosts of a severe climate. 



The period of the larch's greatest vigour is that at which it is 

 most likely to suffer ; that occurs near the time it is about to 

 assume a timber size, or from 12 to 20 feet high, more or less 

 in some plantations, dependent to some extent on the nature of 

 the soil and the seasons. The period is readily seen by referring 

 to the concentric circles on the root of a felled tree, in the same 

 description of soil. The failure of larches at this period of their 



