Ch.XLIII.] ON GAPPING. 541 



hawthorn, and a very hostile and impassable fence it makes ; but crabs 

 are liable to spread too much, and they are far less tractable than the haw- 

 thorn when requiring to be re-made. Tlie fruit also induces boys to 

 clamber over the hedge, which of course suffers materially. 



Some writers advise a mixture of different plants in hedges, in order to 

 make them iu some degree ornamental ; and the common holly has been 

 named as most suitable. The holly being a self-pre&erving plant, makes 

 in time a beautiful hedge ; but it is of too slow a growth for a farmer's 

 purpose, and of all others is most likely to be mangled for walking-sticks, 

 whip-crops, and for Christmas ornaments. There are several plants, too, 

 which should be studiously kept out of hedges, viz , elder, every kind of 

 willow, and fruit trees ; for wherever any of these are, there is, for very 

 obvious reasons, rarelv any fence. As has been already stated, there is 

 no plant better than the hawthorn, because of its uniform growth, hardi- 

 ness, hostilitv, traclableness, and durability. 



Among the many modern improvements in farming, none would be more 

 essentially useful tlian that of planting a part of one of the least valuable 

 fields with underwood for supplying the farm with all kinds of fencing 

 stuff as well as fuel. No farm can be complete without such an appendage. 

 Hop and hurdle poles, stakes, &c., are always in requisition about a farm ; 

 and were a portion of land appropriated to this jjurpose, and i)roi)erly laid 

 down with ash, Spanish chesnut, white willow, &C., it would soon become the 

 most productive part of the farm. 



OF HEDGE-IIOW TIMBER TREES. 



Every landholder has a special interest in a well-timbered estate ; and a 

 well-wooded country has a charm for everybody. That hedge-row timber 

 can be of no benefit to the tenant is universally admitted. That liis crops 

 require neither shade nor shelter from trees is perfectly evident. Where 

 they already exist, the tenant has his remedy in fixing his rent ; but when 

 they are about to be planted requires consideration. 



When a landlord determines to plant hedge-row trees, and both finds the 

 plants, besides being at the expense of planting, protecting, and pruning 

 them into proper form as they grow up, few tenants will oppose the design. 

 But as there is a right and a wrong way of proceeding in such cases, a 

 word of advice on this head may not be superfluous. 



When the bank is made, and the young hedge planted, as already detailed, 

 the trees should be immediately put in, and so placed as to stand within, that 

 is, behind the row of quick. Oak and English elm are the only sorts to be 

 recommended between arable fields. The young trees should be such as 

 have been transplanted at least once in the nursery, and may be from two 

 to three feet high. Care must be taken that the young elms have been 

 raised fro7n layerx, and by no means such as have been grafted. The 

 reason for this is, that the true English, or small-leaved elm, after being 

 established in a favourable situation, throws up an abundance of suckers, 

 which for ever after keep up a valuable succession of young trees to take 

 the ])lace of the principal, when that is felled for use ; but grafted elms are 

 worked on the xoych-elm, and therefore suckers from this would be the 

 common and not llie English elm. 



When young trees are so jdanted, they must be safely protected, because 

 they are the first to suffer from a cow or horse reaching them. 



If it be intended to plant trees behind a hedge, it should be done 

 when the hedge is new made, so that they may grow up together ; and if 

 planted against a cut or shorn hedge, they should be inserted in a little 

 recess, so that they may be out of the way of being rubbed by the sheep 



