472 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



pyramidal in form, with erect stiff leaders ; but in slightly older trees the leader 

 begins to incline over on one side, and the branches to thicken and elongate, and 

 this process being continued, eventually the tree assumes when old the habit of 

 Lebanon cedars, as we see them in English parks. In other parts of the forest 

 the older trees are more or less scattered with the same admixture of junipers and 

 evergreen oak, the undergrowth being Phillyrea and broom. The cedar appeared 

 to be slow in growth, the annual shoots of young vigorous trees not exceeding three 

 or four inches in length. From observations made in one section of this forest 

 the tree shows at different ages the following dimensions : 



1^ ^ #^ n J^ ^ilr j-^^ 



Total Height. 



Feet. 

 98 



105 

 115 

 125 

 125 



An official document, which I saw at Batna, gave the total number of sound 

 trees over 40 inches in girth as 265,500, estimated to contain between ten and 

 eleven million cubic feet of timber, the total timber in the forest, young and old 

 trees, cubing 16,000,000 feet. In addition, there is still standing 900,000 cubic 

 feet of dead timber. In a few spots, as in the Chellala-Bordjen section, there 

 are rather dense stands of old trees, which run to 7000 cubic feet per acre ; but there 

 are large tracts in parts of the forest which have scarcely 1 50 cubic feet to the acre. 



The tree produces seed abundantly every two or three years ; and regeneration 

 is good in favourable situations, as in northerly ravines. The cones ^ disarticulate 

 in November, after the autumnal rains, but if the weather is exceptionally dry, do 

 not open. Seedlings appear under dense cover, but in such situations grow slowly, 

 and do much better in the partially open places between large trees. The wide- 

 spreading branches which the tree ultimately produces show, I think, that in old age 

 it requires a great deal of light, and tends to grow in a more or less isolated 

 condition ; but until middle age the trees bear crowding without injury. In the 

 bare parts of the mountain, where the trees were cut away many years ago, artificial 

 planting has been tried on a small scale, and has succeeded on northern slopes 

 when two-year-old seedlings have been planted in autumn. Plants put out in the 

 spring on the southern slopes have died of drought, which is the great enemy to 

 both artificial and natural regeneration. 



The forest of T^niet-el-H4ad is about a day's journey from Algiers four hours 

 by rail and thence seven hours by the coach to the town, which is distant from the 

 cedars about an hour's walk. The mountain-range runs in a N.W.-S.E. direction, 

 the cedars ascending to the summit of the crest, 5900 feet, and descending on the 

 north side to 4250 feet, and on the south side to 4900 feet, there being a zone of 



' Only the central part of the cone contains good seed. In January the basal scales of many cones were still remaining 

 around the central axis, the other scales having fallen much earlier. 



