TRA^'SACTIONS. 43 



of the locality had disappeared. European geographical de- 

 scriptions, therefore, by the different use of the term for- 

 est, often convey to American readers a very mistaken 

 idea of the countries to which they relate. Extensive 

 ■woods, partly of artificial plantation, do indeed exist on 

 the plains of south-western France, in northern Tuscany, 

 where endemic pestilence has wrested the soil from the 

 dominion of man, upon the mountain ranges of both Italy 

 and France, and in many parts of the G-erman States ; but 

 these regions are not often visited by tourists, nor indeed 

 do they present much of special novelty or interest, in 

 connection with the rural economy of other countries. 



Upon the principal highways of central and southern 

 Europe, forests, in our sense of the word, are nowhere 

 seen ; and the want of them is but imperfectly supplied 

 by the long closely planted rows of trees which fringe 

 the road-side, and stretch along the paths and water- 

 courses. These trees are annually or biennially, accord- 

 ing to the luxuriance of their growth, trimmed of their 

 lateral branches, and sometimes lopped at the top, and 

 the chief supply of fuel, scanty at best, is derived from 

 these poor clippings, which reduce the tallest trees to the 

 similitude of a hop-pole, and deprive them of all family 

 likeness to the umbrageous oaks and elms and beeches 

 that form so fine a feature in English as well as in our 

 American landscape scenery. 



These characteristics of smoothness of surface and ab- 

 sence of woods are common to the most frequently visited 

 provinces of all the countries I propose to notice, but in 

 other particulars they are very widely diversified, whether 

 as respects their physical geography, or the modes, habits, 

 and objects of rural industry. To illustrate these differ- 

 ences I must enter into somewhat of local detail. 



As France is the continental country usually first seen 

 by American tourists, I will suppose you to land on the 

 shores of that empire, and then to visit the Italian States, 



