622 ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III. 
and axletrees for wheels, hop-poles, pales, or for any thing where there is 
liability to rot. This time will not be distant, seeing that the locust grows so 
fast. The next race of children but one, that is to say, those who will be 
born 60 years hence, will think that locust trees have always been the most 
numerous trees in England; and some curious writer of a century or two 
hence will tell his readers that, wonderful as it may seem, ‘ the locust was 
hardly known in England until about the year 1823, when the nation was 
introduced to a knowledge of it by William Cobbett.’ What he will say of 
me besides, I do not know; but I know that he will say this of me. 
{ enter upon this account, therefore, knowing that I am writing for cen- 
turies and centuries to come.” (Jbdid.,§ 351.) The absurdity of the above 
passage renders it almost unworthy of comment; but we may remark 
that, even supposing all that Cobbett says in it of the application of the 
locust were true, the uses which he has enumerated do not amount to a 
hundredth part of those to which timber is applied in this country. Hence, 
were his predictions to be verified, and were the locust to become more pre- 
valent than the oak, we should find its wood a miserable substitute, in the 
construction of ships and houses, for that of our ordinary timber trees. 
Every experienced planter or timber owner, both in Eurepe and America, 
has felt this; and this is the true reason why the tree never has been, and 
never will be, extensively planted. 
There can be no doubt as to the durability of full-grown or matured locust 
wood, and of its fitness for posts, trenails, &c.; but there is no evidence, 
either in Mr. Cobbett’s Woodlands, or in all that was printed in Mr. Withers’s 
Treatise, when he kindly lent us the proof sheets, in April, 1836, that the 
locust is suitable for hop-poles, either in point of rapid growth, or of durability. 
In order to procure the latest information on this subject, we wrote to three 
individuals in the centre of hop countries, and to the Earl of Radnor, Robert 
Rich, Esq., Philip James Case, Esq., and some others, whose letters to Mr. 
Withers in favour of the locust are printed in his book. The general result 
of the whole is, that the locust has scarcely been tried for hop-poles; and 
that, where it has been put to this or analogous uses, it has failed. On Lord 
Radnor’s estate, at Coleshill, his bailiff, the Daniel Palmer so often mentioned 
by Cobbett, says, “ the acacias were tried here for espalier stakes, and soon 
decayed; none have been applied for poles or gate posts. Those planted on 
light land soon got stunted, but some of those in deep land grew well. I am 
of opinion they are not good for much until they get of a good size, and, 
of course, are full of heart, then they will last a long time as posts, &e.” This, 
the reader will recollect, is Mr. Palmer’s opinion, after an experience of 12 
years; the locust trees at Coleshill having been planted in 1823 and 1824. 
We applied, for information on the subject, also to the Bishop of Winchester, 
as residing at Farnham, in the centre of a hop country; and, through His Lord- 
ship’s kindness, we have received a letter from a gentleman, who states that 
the Messrs. Payne were the only hop-growers, at Farnhain, who planted the 
locust with a view to the production of hop-poles. That the poles were not 
fit to cut till the trees had been planted 7 years; and that they have now 
been only used 2 years, so that Messrs. Payne cannot speak as to their dura- 
bility. Maidstone being so celebrated for its hop plantations, we wrote to 
Messrs. Bunyard, nurserymen there; and from them we learn that the locust 
is considered with them too brittle for poles, and that it has not even been 
tried near Maidstone in that capacity, having been only used for supporting 
raspberries. Mr. Masters, the nurseryman, at Canterbury, informs us that 
the locust was planted in that neighbourhood by various hop-growers; that 
almost the whole of the plants were eaten by the rabbits; that some of the 
trees which had escaped were tried as poles, and not found more durable than 
other woods; that the stools did not throw up shoots nearly so well as those 
of other trees; and that the locust is now no longer thought of by the hop- 
growers near Canterbury. The other letters which we have received on the 
subject are to the same effect ; though some of the writers are still great 
