1 6 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



following ; and as the trees are growing fast, considers that it might now be valued at 

 the same price per acre. Sir John considers, from experience in his own plantations, 

 that planted beech will do as well as when naturally seeded. His old woodman, now 

 dead, was for long of a contrary opinion, but changed his mind latterly from his own 

 experience. 



It is necessary to say something about the actual conditions and returns from 

 the Buckinghamshire beech woods, which have been held up by some writers as an 

 example of what may be done by following the system known 2&jardinage in France, 

 which consists in thinning out the saleable trees every ten or twelve years and 

 allowing natural seedlings to come up in their places. 



During a visit of the Scottish Arboricultural Society on July 30, 1903, to this 

 district, in which I took part, it was stated by one of the principal land agents in the 

 district that 2 per acre was a common return over an average of years on woods 

 managed on this system, which seems to have grown up during the last sixty years, 

 partly through the legal disability of the owners to make clear fellings, and partly 

 owing to the regular demand for clean beechwood of moderate size for chair-making. 

 But what I saw myself led me to believe that though such a return may have been 

 obtained for a short period on the best class of beech woods, it is not likely to 

 continue, and that if an owner had a free hand and was not liable for waste, clear 

 felling of the mature timber about once in 60-100 years would probably in the long- 

 run be a better system. And this opinion was confirmed by Mr. George James, 

 agent for the Hampden estate, who thinks that 15s. per acre, which is about the 

 average rateable value of these woods, is as much as they are actually worth, and 

 that when you get fine timber clean and well grown, as on Mr. Drake's estate at 

 Amersham, many natural seedlings do not occur, but that on Earl Howe's estate 

 at Dunn where, forty years ago, all or nearly all of the timber was cut, there is a 

 good growth of young seedlings. 



Professor Fisher of Cooper's Hill has written a very instructive article^ on the 

 Chiltern Hill beech woods, in which he states that^ these are probably the northern 

 and western British limit of the indigenous beech forest, which was probably 

 eradicated during the glacial period in the north of England ; though remains found 

 in the submarine forest-bed at Cromer, in Norfolk, prove that it existed before this 

 period farther east. He quotes measurements taken by Mr. A. S. Hobart 

 Hampden, now director of the Forest School at Dehra Dun, India, which show 

 that on the average it takes ninety years in this district for beech to attain 3 feet 

 in girth at breast height, and that a full crop of seed cannot be expected from trees 

 much younger than eighty years when grown in dense order. He agrees with me 

 that in many of the woods, including those which belong to Eton College, over- 

 thinning has been prevalent, and states that rabbits and brambles have in many 

 cases prevented the natural regeneration from being as complete as it must be to keep 

 such woods in profitable condition under the decennial selection system.* And as 



' Land Agenfs Record, April 9 and 16, 1904. 



2 A paper by Mr. L. S. Wood, in the Tram. Eng. Arbor. Soc. v. 285 (1903), gives many particulars of the beech 

 woods in this district. 



