C 154] 



Extract of a kite)' from Thomas G, Kennedy to James 

 P, Morris, chairman of the committee on Fruit and 

 Forest Trees. 



Read February 12th, 1821. 



The pine and cedar are said to be among the most 

 difficult to grow on being transplanted. Last spring I had 

 wished to plant some pines, but could not conveniently 

 procure any. That my fancy should in some degree 

 have its humour, I procured a few of the common cedar 

 from the woods, and planted them about the usual time 

 of transplanting trees ; several of my neighbours pre- 

 dicted that they would not grow, and indeed I found this 

 prediction verified with regard to most of them except 

 six, which I planted in a small enclosed yard, that was 

 shortly afterwards sodded. These all grew finely, and 

 appeared to have suffered but little, if any, from their 

 removal ; they were occasionally watered, but not more 

 than those round which there were no sods nor grass 

 growing, and which subsequently perished. 



If then the inference that the trees were kept alive, 

 and their growth facilitated, by a degree of moisture be- 

 ing retained about their roots by the covering of sod and 

 grass, which would otherwise have been evaporated by 

 exhalation, be a correct one, may it not furnish a hint 

 by which we may sometimes be saved a good deal of 

 vexation and disappointment, if nothing more. At all 

 events the experiment is an easy one, and it possesses 

 this to recommend it, which unfortunately all experi- 

 ments do not, that it costs nothing.^'*^ 



* See Mr. Taylor's mode of planting the Cedar, vol. 1. p. 

 104. 



