Ill 



FOREST. 



KORKST. 



In Herefordidiire, Warwickshire. Northamptonshire, and Stafford- 

 shire u abundance of fine oak and elm woods. In Buckinghamshire 

 there is a quantity of birch and oak, and also fine beech, SUBMX, once 

 celebrated for the extent and quality of its oak forest*, baa yet some 

 good timber; at present it* woodland*, including coppice-wood, occupy 

 175,000 acre*. Essex, with 60,000 acres of woodbind, baa some elms 

 and oaks. Surrey, Hertfonlshire, and Derbyshire abound in coppice- 

 woods. In Worcestershire is abundance of oak and 1 1m, In Oxford- 

 shire there are the forest* of Whichwood and Stokenchurch, chiefly of 

 beech, with some oak, ash, birch, and aspen. Berkshire contains a part 

 of Windsor forest ; and Gloucestershire, the forest of Dean ; so that 

 these three last counties are extensively wooded, and with noble trees. 

 Cheshire has few woods of any extent, but the hedge-row timber and 

 coppices are in such abundance as to give the whole country, especially 

 when seen from an elevation, the appearance of a vast forest. Of the 

 remaining counties, some have very little wood, and a few are altogether 

 without ; but the want and value of timber have given rise to a great 

 many flourishing plantations. Of late years the flanks of the Cum- 

 brian mountains, the sides of the fells, and the borders of the lakes, in 

 Cumberland, Westmoreland, and Lancashire, have been extensively 

 planted, chiefly with Scotch fir and larch. In Wales also, there is a 

 rage for planting. In South Wales alone six millions of trees, it is 

 said, are annually planted ; if that is the case, nine-tenths of the 

 number must come to nothing, or the whole country would be one 

 entire forest. 



SmtJaud has few forests of large timber, if we except the woods of 

 Inverness-shire and Aberdeenshire. In the former of these counties 

 the natural pine-woods exceed the quantity of this wood growing 

 naturally in all the rest of Britain. In Strathspey alone them are 

 15,000 acres of natural firs ; and in other parts the woods are reckoned 

 by miles, not by acres ; there are also oak woods, and extensive tracts 

 of birch. In Aberdeenshire, in the higher divisions of Mar, there are 

 100 square miles of wood and plantations. The pines of Braemar are 

 magnificent in size, and are of the finest quality. Argyllshire, Dum- 

 bartonshire, and Stirlingshire have many thousands of acres of coppice- 

 wood, and, with a very few exceptions, the remaining counties have 

 many, and some very extensive plantations. 



Inland has every appearance of having been once covered with wood, 

 but at the present day timber is exceedingly scarce in that country, 

 there being no woods, if we except a portion along the sea-coast of 

 Wicklow, the borders of the lake Gilly, in Sligo, some remains of an 

 ancient forest in Galway, and some small woods round Lough Lene, in 

 the county of Kerry. The lakes of Westmeath have also s >me wooded 

 islands. There are extensive plantations in Watcrford, and a few 

 natural woods, of small extent, in Cavan and Down ; but Fermanagh is 

 the best wooded part of Ireland. The want of wood however in this 

 country, as far as it is employed for fuel, is little felt, in consequence 

 of its extensive bogs, which furnish an almost inexhaustible quantity 

 of peat 



Upon the whole then, though Great Britain and Ireland do not now 

 possess any extensive forests, still there is a considerable quantity of 

 timber, and the extent of new plantations seems to promise that we 

 shall never be wholly destitute of so essential an article as wood. 

 According to M'Culloch, there is annually cut down in Great Britain 

 and Ireland timber to the value of 2,000,000/. 



If from our own country we pass over to the continent of Europe, 

 .we shall find forests of much greater extent, particularly in the 

 north-east 



JVortcay. In the southern part of this country the mountains are 

 covered with wood ; birch, maple, pine, and fir, forming immense 

 forest*; the fir, sometimes attaining a height of 160 feet, is in great 

 estimation for masts and building timber : in the regions of moderate 

 elevation are aspens. The good lands have some fine forests of oak, 

 which extend as far as Drontheim, in 63 north latitude. The forests 

 of Smden are similar to those of Norway. In the damp places there 

 grows in abundance the almond-leaved willow i.Wi./ umyuilnlinti). 



Denmark. Of this country it may be remarked that Jutland, once 

 covered with thick forests, has now only a few long slips on its eastern 

 side. HoUtcin has very little wood. The island of Kuncn has some 

 small woods, as also Sealand^in that part of it which borders on the 

 Sound. Fahttar is well wooded, and Bornholm has a good deal of birch. 

 In all, Denmark possesses about 130 square leagues of wood, chiefly 

 birch ; there is also ash, alder, and oak, but pine and fir are scarce. 



J/'JIand possum 1 * timber, though not in very great quantity, generally 

 speaking ; what there is, consists of beech, fir, poplar, and ash ; willow 

 growi i along the canals, and the coppices are of maple, ash, hornbeam, 

 birch, and beech, with a slight portion of oak-bushes. In Guclderland 

 there are plantations of many miles in extent of fir and Weymouth 

 pine*, and ninny hundred acres have been sown with acorns. At 

 ith'-nrn there are thick woods, as also at Arnheim ; and many plan- 

 tations have been formed on the upper Yawl of fir, pine, oak, beech, 

 and birch. 



Germany is so well-wooded that the forest* are estimated to cover 

 about one-third of the whole surface, though some consider this 

 estimate too large. In //./ic.rw are some fine groves, and a quantity 

 of limes and willows planted in rows. This kingdom also includes 

 about three-fifths of the Harz forest. In Wnlphalia there aiv very 

 extensive forests, one in particular, in the neighbourhood of Osuabriick, 



is about 82 miles long and 20 broad. These woods, in which there U 

 abundance of the finest oak timber, are stocked with swin^, and furnish 

 the hams so generally esteemed over all Europe. In Jiraniaick the 

 woods and plantations cover a surface of near 300,000 acres. / 

 is alto abundantly supplied with forest* and plantation*. Uate Cauel 

 has about a million of acre* of wood, and the Rhenish province* are 

 amply furnished with it Pnuaia possesses about 18 millions of acre* 

 of woodland. Near Kunnersdorff u a wood 20 miles in length. The 

 banks of the Oder are well furnished with fine oak*, a* also pines, 

 birches, and willows, of extraordinary dimensions ; elm* do not thrive. 

 In several places the roads for miles are bordered with poplars, and 

 there U abundance of flourishing plantations. Bohemia possesses forests 

 of all the tree* common in Germany; they are regularly cut, and 

 furnish upwards of 270 millions of cubical feet of wood, of which, as it 

 greatly exceeds the consumption of the country, a considerable part i* 

 exported. Bararia grows a quantity of fine oak and beech timber : 

 the principal forest* are those of Spessart, the Rhon-Gebirge, Zwieslar, 

 Mitten, Kulwald, Retzler, Lorentz, 4c. ; they cover together a surface 

 of upwards of seven millions of acres, being about 29-hundredth* 

 of the whole superficial of the country. In Wiirtrmberg, the forest* 

 occupy about one-third of the whole surface. Bailin counts about 

 two millions of acres of forests, consisting of oak and pine. In 

 the Archduchy of Atna, though there are many forests, they have 

 been so long neglected, that wood U comparatively scarce and dear. 

 The Hungarian ttatet have, towards the north and west, as also 

 in Transylvania, some very extensive forests : that of Bakony, the 

 most considerable in the country, is fuU of the finest oaks. The plains 

 are in general bare of wood, but the Carpathians are covered with the 

 dwarf pine (Pinia pumilio). The whole coontry contains about 12 

 millions of acres of forest The Tyrol abounds in timber, of which a 

 quantity is exported to Venice. 



Switzerland is abundantly wooded, particularly with the cone-bearing 

 trees. Oaks are found occupying a region which rises to the height of 

 2800 feet above the sea, beyond which, and to the height of 4000 feet, 

 there are beech woods ; the firs are found at the height of 5500 feet 



France has many fine forests, though hardly sufficient for the con- 

 sumption of a country where wood is the chief combustible (and indeed 

 is protected as such in the interest of the forest proprietors, to the 

 detriment of the extraction of mineral fuel), and where the state of 

 the arts and general civilisation create a constant demand for large 

 timber and wood of every kind. The variety of climate and position 

 in that country are however favourable to the growth of all kinds of 

 European and many exotic trees ; the oak, the birch, the elm, the ash, 

 and the beech, are abundant ; the elder grows in the damp places, and 

 the mountains are clothed with pines and fir. The woods are pretty 

 generally distributed over the country ; and of the 86 departments 

 into which the country is divided, there are 24, in each of which there 

 are from 100,000 to 200,000 acres of wood, a dozen more containing 

 from 200,000 to 800,000 acres, 6 having from 300,000 to 400,000 acres, 

 and 3 which reckon each above 400,000 acres. The department of 

 Dordogne alone contains upwards of 1,000,000 acres of wood.' In all 

 France there is reckoned about 21,000,000 of acres of woods and 

 forests; of which about one-seventh, consisting of 1473 different 

 forests, belong to the state. 



Italy, the geographical position and local peculiarities of which are 

 favourable in a high degree to vegetation of every kind, is not par- 

 ticularly rich in forest trees. There is at Ravenna an extensive forest 

 of the stone pine (Pintu pinea). The Apennines also have their por- 

 tion of coniferous trees, and are in some places covered to the top 

 with luxuriant forests of chestnut-trees. The fertile basin of the Po 

 abounds in plantations of olive, mulberry, fig, and almond-trees, while 

 the pyramidal poplar forms a contrast by its tapering fonn with the 

 flattened and branchy head of the stone pine ; and the same may be 

 said of other parts of Italy. In Xiciltt the forests have long since been 

 exhausted, and wood is extremely rare in that island. But in Sardinia 

 one-fifth of the surface is covered with ancient forests of oak, among 

 whirli is the cork oak (Quarciu tuber), the common oak (Q. robur), and 

 the evergreen oak (Q. Her). 



Spain and Portugal are deficient in wood, both as regards quantity 

 and quality. The peninsula however is not unfavourable to the 

 growth of timber ; in the time of the Moors, the southern provinces 

 in particular possessed some noble forests, but they have long since 

 been devastated; and although since the tune of Philip II. there has 

 existed an excellent code of forest laws, they are altogether disregarded 

 or evaded. Nevertheless there are still some forests in Spain ; thus 

 between the two Bagneres, in the Spanish valley of Aran, and on 1> th 

 sides of the western Pyrenees, there are forests of the silver fir ; and 

 on the south side of these mountains, east of Benasque, as also near 

 Mont Pedru, and on the hills surrounding Andorra, are woods of the 

 Piniu uncinata ; and in the neighbourhood of Campo, in Upper Ara- 

 gon, are forest* of the Phius pymiaira, or, according to some, the 

 P. Larirhio, or Corsican pine. On the Sierra de Cucnca, the Sierra de 

 Segura, the Nevada, and the Serrania de Konda, are some tract* of 

 dilli-ivnt kinds of pine, as the /'. 7/.'x/mir<i, or Spanish )>inr (/ 

 pentii). The Aleppo pine grows in considerable quantities in Catalonia, 

 and in the western part of Andalusia is a forest of the stone pine. 

 The principal forest of Spain however is that of St. Ildcfonso, which is 

 chiefly of the Scotch pine (P. tylvettrit). In the maritime part of the 



