32 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



the method of treatment has been of a kind wherein the quota 

 of cubic feet annually cut is obtained, as far as possible, from 

 a few places, and the fellings are consequently concentrated, 

 resulting in relatively large gaps, which are afterwards planted 

 up. And now, for the last three or four years, young oak 

 plants have been found springing up in ever-increasing 

 quantities. The above-mentioned successful seeding in the 

 Forest of Mormal was, it must be confessed, a good deal 

 aided by the fact that rabbits disappeared during the war. 



V. M. Jagerschmidt relates the truly remarkable story 

 (particularly from the forest point of view) of the Sologne 

 district, which lies to the south of the Loire, in the great bend 

 of that river by Orleans. The country is practically level, 

 at a low altitude —loo to 200 metres above the sea. The 

 soil is sand, of a depth of from i to 10 feet, above an 

 impermeable subsoil, and therefore liable to become marshy 

 when not properly drained. In former days it was a thriving 

 district, well populated, but in the latter part of the eighteenth 

 century it had altogether deteriorated, had lost its population, 

 and had become marshy and unhealthy. In 1787 people 

 awoke to this state of misery, but until 1859 nothing beyond 

 much writing was done. From the latter date, however, plant- 

 ing on a large scale began, and by 1879, 197,600 acres of 

 Maritime (Cluster) pine plantations had grown up. Naturally, 

 and no doubt correctly, they used a pine in that sandy country, 

 and the particular pine used comes easily from seed, which 

 was cheap, while the tree was quick-growing. Then came 

 the great winter of 1879-80, when the thermometer sank to 

 1 8 degrees below zero Fahrenheit, and practically the entire 

 wooded area of the Sologne was destroyed — only such small 

 plants as were below the snow escaped. 



Nothing daunted the proprietors (it is private proprietors who 

 have done the planting) set to work again, with the strong 

 help of the Government, which until 1885 distributed millions 

 of seeds and plants, either free or at very cheap rates. This 

 time they used a mixture of Scots and Maritime pine. And 

 since one of the principal things the Government did was to 

 establish nurseries, with a peripatetic professional nursery man 

 in charge, the nurseries remained. Even by 1885 five-eighths 

 of the area destroyed had been replanted, and in twenty years 



