WALNUT TKEES IN SCOTLAND. 203 



while at Hawkstone Park, in Shropshire, at 1000 feet above 

 sea-level, there is a fine specimen 99 feet in height, and 22 

 feet in girth at 1 foot and 16 feet 6 inches at 5 feet from 

 the ground, with a circumference of branches embracing 279 

 feet. The causes of the scarcity of fine trees in this country 

 must, therefore, be looked for to other than climatic reasons, 

 and it may probably be accounted for on the following grounds. 

 The walnut in Britain never has been, at any period since its 

 introduction, propagated either as a timber or as a fruit tree 

 to anything like the same extent as it has been in France and 

 other continental countries, where from an early date every pos- 

 sible encouragement has been given to its increase and cultiva- 

 tion. In this country it has been more planted as an orna- 

 mental or park tree, its chief use when cut down being for the 

 manufacture of gun or musket stocks, for which it was formerly 

 in great demand, and for the supply of which large quantities of 

 walnut timber were imported from the Continent. During the 

 Peninsular wars, when many of the chief continental ports and 

 markets were closed against us, walnut timber in Britain rose to 

 an enormous price, as we may judge from the fact of a single tree 

 having been sold for £600 ; and as such prices offered tempta- 

 tions which few proprietors were able to resist, a great 

 number of the finest walnut trees growing in this country 

 were sacrificed about that period to supply this trade. The 

 deficiency and scarcity thus created, as well as the hi^h 

 price, led to the introduction of the American walnut 

 timber, as well as of large supplies from the coasts of 

 the Black Sea, from whence any quantity can always be 

 obtained, and at prices lower than the timber can be grown 

 for in Britain. Hence this facility of procuring unlimited 

 supplies from abroad has also done away with the inducement 

 to plant walnut trees in this country, where it is a slow- 

 growing and long-lived tree before reaching maturity as a 

 timber crop, and its cultivation as such may be said to be 

 at an end in Great Britain, and especially so in Scotland. 

 Tlie few specimens left to us of any magnitude sliow well 

 as trees of position, and for effect, in the landscape, as well as 

 for variety of foliage in mixed plantations, but only as such 

 will the -walnut take its place among the forest trees of ScotLand 

 in the future. Indeed, it is probably best adapted for plantin'-- 

 now as a park tree, or in hedge rows ; for, in mixed plantations, 

 its enormous and deep-penetrating roots, — indicating <Teat 

 power and resistance to the elements, — and its impatience of 

 interference, evince its unsocial habits, and mark it out as better 

 fitted for an open or exposed site ; and the only objection that 

 can be stated to its extensive introduction as an ornamental 

 tree of first importance, is its late period of coming into folia<'e 



