The Rescue of an Old Place 



nothing to bring to the surface but stones ? 

 Cultivation being apparently out of the 

 question, the trees would have to take 

 their chance, and a wretched chance, too, 

 for the south shore of Massachusetts Bay 

 is subject to long and severe droughts, 

 and to several months of hot weather in 

 the summer. 



A north But here we were upheld by our author- 



s $ e pZ. ities. An excellent book on forestry gave 

 us some consoling statistics, and later, our 

 favorite horticultural journal was invalu- 

 able in its suggestions. We found that in 

 reforesting hills in France and Switzerland 

 that had been swept bare by avalanches, 

 a northeast slope proved the most favor- 

 able exposure for the growth of young 

 Pines, and, if we had nothing else, we had 

 plenty of north and east, with the winds 

 thrown in ; so, if that was the sort of thing 

 that they liked, why, bring on the Pines, 

 and let them have all they want of it. 



But by the time we got round to this 

 job, as the farmers say, the season for 

 spring planting of Pines was over, and an 

 exceptionally dry and burning summer was 

 in full blast, and the very grass on the hill 

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