CHAP, vii S Y L V A 87 



sterling : And I have been credibly inform 'd, that 

 one person hath planted so much of this one sort of 

 timber in his life time, as hath been valued worth 

 fifty thousand pounds to be bought. These are pretty 

 encouragements, for a small and pleasant industry. 

 That there is a lower, and more knotty sort, every 

 husbandman can distinguish. 



2. The keys or toungs being gathered from a 

 young thriving tree when they begin to fall (which 

 is about the end of October, and the ensuing month) 

 are to be laid to dry, and then sowed any time betwixt 

 that and Christmas ; but not altogether so deep as 

 your somer masts : Thus they do in Spain, from 

 whence it were good to procure some of the keys 

 from their best trees : A very narrow seminary will 

 be sufficient to store a whole country : They will lie 

 a full year in the ground before they appear ; there- 

 fore you must carefully fence them all that time, and 

 have patience : But if you would make a considerable 

 wood of them at once, dig, or plow a parcel of 

 ground, as you would prepare it for corn, and with 

 the corn, especially oats, (or what other grain you 

 think fittest) sow also good store of keys, some crab- 

 kernels, Gfc. amongst them : Take off your crop of 

 corn, or seed in its season, and the next year follow- 

 ing, it will be cover'd with young ashes, which 

 will be fit either to stand (which I prefer) or be 

 transplanted for divers years after ; and these you will 

 find to be far better than any you can gather out of 

 the woods (especially suckers, which are worth 

 nothing) being removed at one foot stature (the 

 sooner the better) ; for an ash of two years thus taken 

 out of the nursery, shall outstrip one of ten, taken out 

 of the hedge ; provided you defend them well from 



