68 The greater summer-leafing trees 



of 6 to 8 feet round. The natural form of the tree is 

 often spoiled by pollarding. It is almost free from insect 

 pests, resists the roughest winds, yields a grateful shade 

 in summer, and is so hardy as not to fear the sharpest 

 spring frosts. In northern Europe the Hornbeam is 

 commonly found fringing the great Beech forests, in 

 low-lying land where that tree is hardly secure in early 

 spring. 



The Wych or Mountain Elm. In this we have a tree 

 of our own land and one of dignity and beauty, better 

 seen with us than in any other country, though it occurs 

 also in the northern parts of Europe and Asia. It is so 

 abundant in Scotland and the north country as to bear 

 the name of Scotch Elm, and though less common south 

 of the Tweed, there are Elms in many parts of the 

 country remarkable for their stature and picturesque 

 form. The stiff outline and tapering column of the Field 

 Elm gives place to a massive trunk often of vast girth, 

 breaking into great limbs which are larger and wider 

 spreading and carry a more massive crown of deep 

 green, which usually falls in the autumn a little sooner. 

 The branches are more or less drooping, falling into 

 free and graceful forms rather than the trim roundness 

 of many trees. 



In Yorkshire it reaches its highest point in Britain 

 1,300 feet, and this moderate record is distanced by the 

 Field Elm, which rises to 1,500 feet amid the hills of 

 Derbyshire. In the mountain forests of Switzerland and 

 Germany it attains an elevation of 3,000 feet or a little 

 more, but it is nowhere a high mountain tree, choosing 

 rather the lower slopes and the steep moist banks 

 through which the moisture from above finds its way to 

 the rivers. 



