612 ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III. 



height of 30 ft. and upwards, in 10 years from the time they were planted. 

 Cobbett and Withers record instances of much more rapid growth. The 

 former, in his JVood/ands (§ 382.), mentions a plantation at Coleshill, in 

 which the trees averaged 19ft. after being 4 years planted; and others at 

 Botley, which, in 11 years had attained the height of 4:0 ft., with trunks 

 " 3 ft. 2 in. round at the bottom^" (Ibid., ^ 358.); and in Withers's Treatise, 

 p. 254'., mention is made of 900 plants, placed 4 ft. apart in 1824, which, 

 in 1828, had reached to from 13 ft. to 16 ft. in height, and were to be cut 

 down, and used as hop-poles. 



A plantation of locusts, Scotch pines, sycamores, limes, Spanish chest- 

 nuts, beeches, ashes, and oaks was made in 1812, at Earl's Court, near 

 Kensington, and the trees measured, at Cobbett's request, in 1827 ; when 

 it was found that the locust had grown faster tiian any one kind of 

 the other trees in the proportion of 27 to 22, and faster than the average of 

 them in the proportion of 27 to 18. (See Woodlands, §. 375., and Gard. 

 Mag., vol. iii.p. 363.) This comparatively rapid growth of the locust, which 

 is in a great measure confirmed by othtr measurements in Mr. Withers's 

 Treatise, is owing to the spreading roots of the tree having the power of 

 more rapidly extracting nourishment from the soil than the descending roots 

 of the other trees among which it was planted; but these other trees, 

 with descending roots, though they grow slower than the locust at first, 

 would, in the course of 30 or 40 years, overtop it, and ultimately destroy 

 it altogether, as has been proved in the Bois de Boulogne near Paris. 



Gcograp/ij/. In North America, the locust tree, as it is there called, 

 begins to grow naturally in Pennsylvania, between Lancaster and Harris- 

 burgh, in the lat. of 40° 20"; west of the Alleghanies, it is found 2° or 

 3° farther north ; because, on the west side of these mountains, the climate 

 is milder, and the soil more fertile than on the east of them. It is most abun- 

 dant in the south-west, abounding in all the valleys between the chains of the 

 Alleghany mountains, particularly in Limestone Valley. It is conmion in all 

 the western states, between the Ohio, the Illinois, the lakes, and the Mis- 

 sissippi. It is plentiful in Upper Canada, and also in Lower Canada; but it 

 is not found in the states east of the river Delaware, nor does it grow sjjon- 

 taneously in the maritime parts of the middle and southern states, to the dis- 

 tance of from 50 to 100 miles from the sea. It is planted, however, in that 

 region ("or purposes of both utility and ornament. It is observed by Mi- 

 chaux, that the locust forms a much smaller proportion of the American 

 forests than the oaks and walnuts, and that it is nowhere found occupying 

 tracts, even of a few adres exclusively. Hence the tree, where it is met with, is 

 frequently spared by settlers, as being ornamental, and comparatively rare ; in 

 the same manner as the black walnut is frequently spared for the same 

 reasons, and for its fruit. Hence, also, old specimens of these two trees, 

 which have belonged to the aboriginal forests, are frequently seen growing in 

 the midst of cultivated fields. 



History. There is, perhaps, no American tree respecting which so much has 

 been said and done, in Europe, as the locust. It was one of the first trees 

 that we received from that country, and it has been more extensively 

 propagated than any other, both in France and England. It has been al- 

 ternately extolled and neglected in both countries ; and even at the present 

 time, though the beauty of its foliage and flowers is generally acknowledged, 

 and though it has, at different periods, been enthusiastically praised by 

 different writers, for the valuable properties of its wood, it cannot be con- 

 sidered as holding a high rank as a timber tree, or as being generally planted 

 with a view to profit. 



The seeds of this tree, it is stated in Martyn's Miller and most other British 

 works, and even in the Nouveau Du Hamel and Baudrillart's Dictionnairc, 

 were first sent to Europe to Jean Robin, gardener to Henry IV. of France, in 

 1601 ; but, according to Deleuze, as quoted, p. 136., and also to Adanson, in 

 the article /icacia, in the French Encychpcedia, the locust was sent from 



