78 Native and European trees 



from which springs the column of the Pine will do 

 nothing for the Oak, and an}^ tree, native or exotic, is 

 profitless and often ugly on ground that does not suit it. 

 Wood value. For quality and value of wood the native 

 tree is by far the best. Nothing else that can be done 

 with the land that suits our native Oak will pay so well 

 with so little labour. The natural Beech woods of 

 Normandy and Britain are among those that more than 

 repay the owners. No foreign tree we grow, except 

 the Larch, now stricken in many districts by a disease 

 which threatens to make it useless for us, equals in 

 value the wood of our Oak, Ash, and Tree Willows. 

 The facility of increase of our native trees should also 

 be thought of; and it is clear from what we may see in 

 a neglected field that the Wealden land in Kent or 

 Sussex would soon be a forest of Oak if let alone. If 

 we plant Pines in an arable field that has been under 

 the plough for years, we shall probably find Ash, Oak, 

 and Birch, sown by squirrels, mice, or winds, starting 

 up here and there and keeping pace with the quickest 

 growing Pines. But it is not only the value as timber 

 of our native trees I wish to show, it is their beauty ; 

 no trees introduced from other countries equal in that 

 our native ones, with the exception of the Cedar of 

 Lebanon. In many districts there are no natural old 

 woods where our native trees can be seen in their forest 

 forms ; but the beauty exists for all who care to see it, 

 and in many ways. What various forms the Oak 

 assumes in chase, or park, or wood, and perhaps most 

 impressively in old Oak woods, where the trees stand 

 tall and close. The tree varies in different countries ; 

 such stately Oaks as we may see by the roadside in 

 Warwickshire we never see south of London, where 



