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As to the kinds to be used, and the mode of planting or starting them, everything 

 depends upon the soil, climate, and other circumstances. As a general rule, the Coniferse, 

 from, their liability to suffer from fires, are not desirable near a railroad track, and in 

 some places in Europe, the birch and other deciduous trees are planted along the sides of 

 lines that run through a pine or spruce forest. 



There are other cases in which judicious planting may prove of inestimable advant- 

 age, as well to railroads as to common highways, in preventing drifting snows. In our 

 northern States and in Canada this becomes in winter a matter of great anxiety to the 

 traveller, and often of vast expense to railroad companies. It may in every instance be 

 alleviated or wholly prevented by judicious planting, especially on the side of the prevail- 

 ing winds. A single row of deciduous trees will scarcely produce an effect ; there should 

 be at least half a dozen rows, and in the more exposed places twice this number, set as 

 closely as may be conveniently grown, to secure full immunity from this cause. A double 

 row of evergreens will generally serve the purpose, but it would still be well in a bleak 

 exposure to have a narrow belt of woodland on the outside to break the force of the 

 storm, and protect the plantation from injury. 



So important has this subject proved to be, that the ISTorthern Pacific Railroad in 

 Minnesota and Dakota has undertaken to protect its line at all the cuttings and exposed 

 places for the whole of the distance or as far as it is possible to make trees survive, and 

 with the view of continuing these plantations at places where it is less necessary for the 

 general benefits to be derived from their presence. 



Several otlier railroad companies in the northern and western States have given 

 attention to planting, in some cases for shelter against drifting snows, and in others for 

 the encouragement of settlement, by proving the capacity of the country for the growth 

 of forest trees, in treeless regions on the prairies and the plains. 



This subject has in recent years been receiving attention in Russia and other countries, 

 with the most encouraging results. 



In these plantations along railroads in a pi-airie region, it is necessary to prepare the 

 soil for planting, by previously breaking, and afterwards thoroughly and deeply ploughing, 

 and to afterwards cultivate the trees until they have grown sufficiently to shade the 

 ground. It is also necessary to guard against accident from fires whether those that are 

 set by locomotives, or those that sweep over the prairies in the dry seasons, destroying 

 every living thing in their way. The best modes of prevention against these fires, is by 

 carefully burning off the dead herbage and dry materials, selecting for this a time when 

 the fires can be controlled and limiting their spread by a few furrows of freshly ploughed 

 soil. As a country becomes well settled these running fires become infrequent and 

 almost unknown, and the care required in protection grows every year less. 



Although there may be infinite advantages derived from ornamental plantations 

 around railway stations, the idea of affording shade to the traveller by avenues along the 

 line presents more points than one for consideration. Along the common highway they 

 become a positive luxury in a hot summer day, as the carriage passes leisurely along 

 under their shade. Is it the same with the flitting shadows on a railway train t Does 

 not the effect become painful to the eyes, and is not the beauty of the scenery lost when 

 the shade is too near, and when thei-e is too much of it ? Whoever has travelled in 

 Northern Itlay must have realized this discomfort from the abundance of trees planted, 

 perhaps, partly for ornament, but oftener for use along the sides of the railways. They 

 are far enough apart to afford glimpses of distant scenery — perhaps of marvellous beauty 

 — but in an instant obscured to be the next moment revealed, and so continually till the 

 eyes grow weary and close upon the scenery they cannot enjoy. 



