6o History of the English Landed Interest. 



Edinburgh nurseryman, wrote at the same period a treatise 

 on the subject of arboriculture ; and in 1760 John Webb, seeds- 

 man, of Acoun, near West Bridge, edited a catalogue of hardy 

 plants, with instructions for sowing and planting. We have 

 in our possession the list of a certain William Wright, of Leith 

 Walk, for the year 1757, in which he not only advertises the 

 prices of all the commonest sylvan plants, but offers to furnish 

 the nobility and gentry with experienced foresters. The 

 catalogue contains 79 varieties of trees, 174 flowering shrubs 

 and evergreens, besides 26 different sorts of roses, most of the 

 commoner fruit trees, and a few flower roots. Nor are the 

 prices, even if compared with those advertised by modern 

 nurserymen, unreasonable. Fine-grown plants from three to 

 four feet high of the English elm, laburnum, and lime are 

 offered at \d. each ; Weymouth pines one foot in height also 

 at 4c?. ; cedars of Lebanon at Is. 6cZ. ; deciduous cypresses at 

 2s. ^d. ;. scarlet oaks at 6cZ. ; walnuts and sweet chestnuts at 

 2rf. ; and ash at \d. Other varieties are quoted at so much per 

 one hundred and twenty ; thus, Lombardy poplars are 9s. ; 

 Scots firs, 8s. ^d. ; larch, 6s. ; silver and spruce fir, 5s. ; Scots 

 oaks, 6s. ^d. ; Scots elms, 3s. ; horse-chestnuts, 5s. ; service 

 trees, six feet high, 10s. ; and beeches of different sizes, from 

 6s. to £5 per 1,200. 



The importance of the timber trade at this period is further 

 evidenced by the inventions for measuring trees. As early as 

 1730 a certain John Richards, of Exeter, wrote The Gentle- 

 man^ s Steward and Tenants of Manors Instructed, in which he 

 described an instrument for estimating the cubic feet of 

 standing timber ; and in 1761 John Mordaunt, in The Complete 

 Steward, produced tables for computing its measurements. 



All this energy was by no means expended for the sake of 

 mere pleasure, A very grave crisis was impending when the 

 timber supply for the national Navy would be found wholly 

 inadequate. As early as 1721 the number of deals imported 

 into England was just under four millions, in 1790 it was close 

 on six millions.^ The supply of native oak to the dockyards 

 had long been supplemented with foreign stuff. A monopoly 

 ^ Annals of Agriculture, vol. xviii. p. 34. 



