PLANTING ON MOORLANDS. 153 



deep as possible without covering the top of the hill. 

 Upon swamps containing rich soil should be planted 

 spruces, oaks and beeches, with which ash, elm and 

 maple, may be mixed. On such places the most lucrative 

 forest management for producing timber and lumber 

 can be introduced, as here also all valuable light-needing 

 trees prosper and grow so strongly that even an inter- 

 mixture of the otherwise much dreaded birch may be 

 permitted. 



If the soil of the swamp is poor, spruces and oaks 

 may be planted under the protection of the pine. On 

 sloughs, that is, swamps with such wet ground as can- 

 not be drained at all, the swamp hickory, alder and black 

 ash will still thrive, and even the spruce and balsam fir 

 will grow and exercise a beneficient effect in absorbing 

 the moisture of the ground and rendering it more com- 

 pact. 



CHAPTER III. 



FOREST PLANTING ON MOORLANDS. 



LEAVING the low bottom lands of the rivers called 

 the alluvium and ascending to the higher plains we 

 find, that, in the original state of the country, a few 

 kinds of the Erica family take possession of the territory 

 both dry and wet, and form the principal vegetation. 

 Only where the ground is too sandy and loose do they 

 give way to lichens, mosses and other plants which are 

 content with very poor soil, as for instance, small leaved 

 winter dock, corn marigold etc. Those Ericas possess 

 the peculiarity of secreting through their leaves much 



