298 AMERICAN AGRICULTURE. 



present be made to pay, from its large expense ; and if the 

 trees will not grow naturally or by sowing, the land should 

 be continued in pastures or cultivation. There are some 

 lands so unfitted for tillage by their roughness or texture, 

 as to be much more profitable as woodland. It is better to 

 retain such in forest, and make from them whatever they 

 can thus produce, rather than by clearing and bringing 

 them into use, to add them to superfluous tillage fields, and 

 become a drain on labor and manures which they indiffer- 

 ently repay. 



In clearing lands, when it is desirable to reserve trees for 

 a park or shade, a selection should be made of such as are 

 young and healthy, which have grown in the most open 

 places, with a short stem and thick top. It will tend to in- 

 sure their continued and vigorous growth, if the top and 

 leading branches be shortened. Large trees will seldom 

 thrive when subjected to the new condition in which they 

 are placed, after the removal of the shade and moisture by 

 which they have been surrounded. They will generally 

 remain stationary or soon decay ; and the slight foothold 

 they have upon the earth by their roots, which was suffi- 

 cient for their protected situation while surrounded by other 

 trees, exposes them to destruction from violent gales ; and 

 they do not acquire or attain that beauty of top and symme- 

 try of appearance which should entitle them to preservation. 

 If partialities are to be indulged for any, they should be sur- 

 rounded by a copse of younger trees, by which they will be 

 in a measure protected. Young stocks should be left in 

 numbers greater than are required, as many of them will 

 die, and from the remainder, selections can be made of such 

 as will best answer the purpose designed. 



THE PROPER TIME FOR CUTTING- TIMBER. 



Nine tenths of the community think winter the time for 

 this purpose, but the reason assigned that the sap is then in 

 the roots, shows its futility, as it is evident to the most su- 

 perficial observer, that there is nearly the same quantity of 

 sap in the tree at all seasons. It is less active in winter, 

 and like all other moisture, is congealed during the coldest 

 weather ; <yet when not absolutely frozen, circulation is 

 never entirely stopped in" the living tree. Reason would 

 seem to indicate, that the period of the maturity of the leaf, 

 or fromHhe last of June to the first of November, is the sea- 

 son for cutting timber in its perfection. Certain it is, that 



