Planting Willows and Pines 



was crisped and dry. Our impatience, 

 however, was too great to permit us to 

 wait for another year to begin our experi- 

 ment. We had read some accounts of 

 August planting of Pines, and determined 

 to have our little fling on the spot, and 

 find out for ourselves whether it was a 

 good time or not. 



So we waited, as anxiously as the pro- 

 phet Elijah, for the first sign of rain, and fc 

 when at last the brassy heavens veiled 

 themselves in cloud about the middle of 

 August, we started off after trees not 

 the pampered darlings of a nursery, used 

 to water and rich soil, but the hardy road- 

 side denizens of dry pastures and sand- 

 hills. We picked out the driest and sandi- 

 est spots to dig them from, so that if their 

 roots discovered nothing to feed upon in 

 their new locality, they would, from long 

 habit, have got used to short commons, and 

 could adapt themselves to the situation. 



Before going out we had the men dig 

 holes over the surface of the side hill with 

 a grub-hoe, banking up the thin soil at the 

 lower side of the holes with sods, so as to 

 make little dams to retain the water ; in 

 19 



