CHAP. CV. CORYLA CE/E. Fa'gVS. 1969 



of March till the beginning of April. Autumn might be adopted for sowing, 

 were it not that the nuts are greedily sought after, through the winter, by mice 

 and other vermin. One bushel of seed, according to Mitchell, weighs Si lb. 

 unheaped, and contains 58,656 seeds. From li bushel of seeds, the produce 

 of the year 1786, kept in sand till the following spring, not less than 150,000 

 plants were raised, and planted on the Muirland Hills, at Dillorn, Stafford- 

 shire, by J. Halliday, Esq., who received a gold medal for so doing. {Trans. 

 Soc. Arts, vo\. X., for 1792, p. 18.) The soil in wliich the nuts are sown 

 ought always to be light, and more or less rich, as the plants are rather tender 

 when young. They may either be sown in beds, or in drills, with the usual 

 covering of soil, being about ] in. The seeds should not lie nearer to one 

 another, when sown, than 1 in. Mast, sown in the autumn, will come up 

 in April ; and that sown in spring, seldom later than the beginning of May. 

 Boutcher sows in the beginning of March, in thin shallow drills, about 1 ft. 6 in. 

 asunder; watering, if the season is dry, frequently, but moderately, from the 

 plants beginning to appear above ground, till the middle of August; which, he 

 says, greatly forwards their growth. " In March, next season, with a spade 

 made very sharp for the purpose, undermine the roots as they stand in the 

 drills, and cut them over between 4 in. or 5 in. under ground. The following 

 autumn or spring, you may either raise the whole, or give tiiem another cut- 

 ting below ground ; when, gently raising such as are too thick, leave the re- 

 mainder, at proper distances, to stand another season. This manner of cutting 

 the roots dexterously has, in a great measure, the same effect as trans- 

 planting." {Treatise, &c., p. 22.) After the plants have stood 2years, or, if 

 in poor soil, 3 years, they may be transplanted in lines 2 ft. asunder, and 

 9 in. or 10 in. in the line. A great error in treating the beech tree at this age, 

 Boutcher observes, is trimming off all its side branches, and planting only the 

 bare stem. This, he says, is doing the greatest violence to the plants, as no 

 tree admits of being less pruned at transplanting than the beech, especially 

 when young; the plants "constantly turning hide-bound and stunted when 

 that is severely done;" therefore, nothing but " very cross ill-placed branches, 

 and even these very sparingly, are to be touched at this time." After the 

 plants have remained in these lines 2 years, they are to be removed into 

 other lines, .3 ft. 6 in. asunder, and at 1 ft. 6 in. apart in the line; whence, after 

 remaining in good soil 3, but in poor land 4, years, they may either be 

 removed into a general plantation, where they are to remain permanently, or, 

 if they are to be transplanted from the nursery of a large size, they nuist 

 undergo the further discipline of being once, twice, or thrice transplanted, till 

 at last they stand 10 ft. asunder every way. During the whole of this treat- 

 ment, they must scarcely receive any pruning, except in the season before 

 final removal. At their removal they must not be pruned at all; but, when 

 once established, they may be pruned at pleasure, as every beech hedge and 

 beech coppice shows. In respect to the latter, indeed, a common expres- 

 sion in Buckinghamshire is, " Cut a beech, and have a beech." 



Final Culture in Plantations. The beech, after being transplanted where it 

 is finally to remain, if in masses, and the plants not above 3 ft. or 4 ft. high, 

 may be cut down to the ground, and the leading shoot produced the following 

 year selected, and trained so as to form a clear stem. It has been found, from 

 experience, that trees of 20 years' or 30 years' growth, when transplanted, suffer 

 much by pruning at that time, and cannot have their heads cut in, like the oak, 

 the elm, and almost every other species of deciduous membranaceous-leaved 

 trees, when they are transplantfed of large size. They may, however, be cut 

 in a year or two years before removal, and will, in that case, transplant with 

 a much better chance of success. Where a beech wood is to be formed 

 on a light poor soil, provided the surface admits of being pulverised by 

 the plough and harrow, or of being trenched, it may be sown with mast in 

 drills, without the admixture of the seeds of any other tree. The ground may 

 be cultivated, for two or three years, between the rows, by horse-hoeing ; and 

 the plants may be thinned out the second year, so as to stand at 6 ft. apart in 



6 M 2 



