CHAPTER V. 



FOREST EXCURSIONS. 



At Villaviciosa there were many local advantages enjoyed 

 by the. students engaged in prosecuting their studies, and 

 there was formed a campo forest'it for their benefit. This 

 took much of the character of an arboretum, in which the 

 students might familiarise their minds with the habits of 

 different kinds of trees, acquire some knowledge of the 

 general appearance and natural history of these ; and 

 acquire some experience in planting, transplanting, and 

 sowing. But there was no campo de practices in which they 

 could be exercised in any way in forest management; nor 

 was there in the immediate vicinity extensive forests, in 

 which a practical knowledge of what is called in Spain 

 Forest ordinacion,or the scientific arrangement of partitions, 

 and of forest exploitations, might be gained. This made it 

 more easy to secure the acquiesence of all concerned in 

 the removal of the school to the Kscurial when that was 

 carried out, though, as has been indicated, this was resolved 

 upon on other considerations. 



Within the domains of this spacious royal palace there 

 existed formerly pine woods of considerable extent, but 

 these unhappily had been sold, and were being so devas- 

 tated as to threaten their entire destruction. There were 

 ceded to the school the forests of the tlerraria and 

 the Romeral, that in these might be established for 

 the school its own field of operations ; but these forests 

 did not admit of the end designed being gained without 

 studies in the replenishing of exhausted forests, and this it 

 was impossible, through lack of mean>?, to effect ; and the 

 forests had been so badly treated that tor their 

 restoration it would be absolutely necessary to suspend 



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