REFERENCE TO THE HORNBEAMS IN EPPINC; FOREST. 9.5 



long as the shoots were cut under the commoners' rights of topping 

 and lopping every fifteen years, this crowding had perhaps Httle evil 

 effect ; but when these rights were abolished one of two results was 

 inevitable, either these pollards must be extensively thinned, or their 

 over-crowded boughs would be drawn up into long, straight, l)are 

 poles, with nothing but some scanty foliage at their summits. This 

 latter alternative has actually happened in that part of Great Monk- 

 wood, in which Mr. Maitland tried the experiment of laissez /aire, 

 and the result is disastrous enough. 



How pollard hornbeams can recover great grace of outline, if given 

 free space soon after pollarding, is well shown by some beautiful trees 

 in Mr. E. N. Buxton's grounds at Knighton. These trees, in addition 

 to ascending branches, have sent out others horizontally, or rather in 

 a descending direction, with the spreading spray and nearly all the 

 beauty of spear trees. 



But little, if any, thinning was carried out by the Corporation for 

 some years after the cessation of the lopping rights, so that even the 

 l)est and soundest pollards afterwards selected for preservation had 

 in those years taken too vertical a direction ; and it may be doubted 

 whether, if left to themselves, though freed from the crowding of 

 their former neighbours, they will ever rival the beauty of the 

 Knighton trees. 



There can be no doubt that extensive thinning was not only 

 desirable, but necessary in many parts of the Forest ; but, admitting 

 this, two questions remain, viz. : (i.) what should be the principle of 

 selection and (ii.) what should be the treatment of the trees 

 selected for preservation. One obvious principle, considering the 

 comparative scarcity of oak in the Forest, has been the preservation 

 of all examples of that species, even when pollarded. This has 

 perhaps been carried to an injudicious extreme in places, between 

 Oak Hill and the Ditches, for example, by the sacrifice of sound 

 trees of other species for pollard oaks too hopelessly rotten ever to 

 be worth anything. Then as regards hornbeams, though some of 

 the most malformed may be worth preserving for their grotes(|ue 

 appearance, especially if decked with polypody, as a rule the 

 soundest should certainly be preserved. In any case, no pollard is 

 immortal, and we may well hope some day to see them replaced by 

 normally grown trees. AN'ith this object, the undergrowth must be 

 preserved as a protection to natural seedlings, and I would urge the 

 desirability of planting hornbeam. 



