

ANCIENT WOODS. 23 



and if they will pay for proper culture, which no 

 one who understands the subject will deny, they 

 ought to receive it, for various weighty reasons, 

 which have been before adverted to. 



The foregoing remarks will apply, of course, 

 most directly, to woods where there is an apparent 

 redundancy of oak. I will now suppose the case of a 

 wood where there is a deficiency r , or little or no oak. 

 Here there ought, unquestionably, to be a full crop 

 of underwood. This underwood ought to be 

 adapted, as to kind, first, to the nature of the soil ; 

 and, secondly, to the local demand, if the heal 

 demand be good: and as to its age, of course it 

 must be that which best suits the market, or when, 

 comparatively, it will fetch the best price ; so that 

 in some districts, as in Kent, for instance, it will 

 sell best, and therefore ought to be cut, at about 

 twelve years of age: in others it would not sell 

 so well at less than from fifteen to twenty years 

 old. But it does not follow as a matter of course, 

 that because a wood has always, previously, stood 

 from twenty to twenty-five years, it should for 

 ever continue to do so ; on the contrary, I should 

 say, that there are very few woods indeed, if any, 



