NEGLECTED PLANTATIONS. 213 



bers; and it becomes our prudence to thin 

 out the least valuable kinds first, provided it 

 may be done without risk of danger. But 

 many cases present themselves, where, to 

 preserve regularity, and shut a gap which 

 might become a funnel for the conveyance 

 of wind, a better must give way to a worse 

 plant, or kind. 



In an extended plantation, a very different 

 degree of caution in thinning may be neces- 

 sary in one part, from that in another, al- 

 though the composition or mixture be the 

 same throughout. This may be occasioned 

 by difference of soil, difference of exposure, 

 or difference of respective health and vigour; 

 and the rules for thinning should be varied 

 accordingly. 



FIR PLANTATIONS require to be cau- 

 tiously gone about, particularly if they have 

 never been thinned, and are tall. In this case, 

 the plants will have long boles without any 

 branches, except, perhaps, near to the top, 

 will be top-heavy, and liable to be broken 

 were the wind let in at once among them. 

 Many plantations of this description have 

 suffered much through inadvertency to this 



