58 The greater summer-leafing trees 



and splendid endurance in northern regions, this is one 

 of the most precious of trees. Many an old Ash about 

 farm-houses is as fine in its winter form as any tree 

 could be; noble in height, too, when grown in high 

 woods. It is an excellent wood to burn and will cook 

 a breakfast in the open air the morning of its fall. 



The Ash grows under very varied conditions, but most 

 commonly on the low plains and in broad river-valleys, 

 or smaller valleys where the soil is cool and in which 

 it attains its greatest size and best value. In no part of 

 England is the Ash so tough and so good in quality as 

 in the Wealden districts of Sussex, Surrey, and Kent. 

 In other counties where it grows more rapidly, the 

 wood is not so good. Cobbett, in his * Woodlands ', 

 notices the storm-resisting qualities of the Ash in his 

 clear way, saying, * It fears not the winds, ... I mean 

 that sort of power which the winds have of checking 

 the growth of trees, and especially those winds near the 

 sea-coasts. On the Hampshire coast the wind that 

 comes from the Atlantic is, of course, a south-west wind. 

 You will see the Oaks, when exposed to this wind, 

 sheared up on the south-west side of them as com- 

 pletely as if shaven with a pair of shears. The head of 

 the tree resembles the top of a broad quickset hedge, 

 which is kept sheared up in a sloping form on one side 

 only . . . and at the same time the everlasting flinching 

 of the tree and the continuance of the weight on one 

 side, while it is kept shaven on the other, makes the 

 trunk of the tree lean away from the south-west. Close 

 by the side of an Oak like this you will see an Ash of 

 equal size and height standing as upright as if in the 

 most sheltered valleys, and I have looked with the most 

 scrutinizing eye without ever having been able to dis- 



