( 7* ) 



may ornament a garden ; but it is by no means, 

 qualified to adorn an expofed country. It'3 

 wood is of fo brittle a texture, efpecially when 

 it is encumbered with a weight of foliage; 

 that you can never depend upon it's aid in 

 filling up the part you wim. The branch you 

 admire to-day, may be demolimed to-morrow. 

 The misfortune is, the acacia is not one of thofe 

 grand objects, like the oak, whofe dignity is 

 often increafed by ruin. It depends on it's 

 beauty^ rather than its grandeur,, which is a 

 quality much more liable to injury. I may add 

 however in it's favour, that if it be eafily in-r 

 jured, it repairs the injury more quickly, than 

 any other tree. Few trees make fo rapid a 

 growth. 



In one of the memoirs publifhed by the agri- 

 cultural fociety at Paris, the virtues of this tree 

 are highly extolled. It's made encourages the 

 growth of grafs. It's roots are fo tenacious of 

 the foil, and moot up in fuch groves of fuckers, 

 that when planted on the banks of rivers, it 

 contributes exceedingly to fix them as barriers 

 againft the incurfions of the ftream. Acacia- 

 flakes too are as durable as thofe of any wood. 

 In North- America this tree is much valued; 

 in proof of which the memorialift tells a ftory 

 of a farmer in Long-ifland, who planted an 



ordinary 



