88 SYLVA BOOK i 



cattel, which are exceedingly licorish after their tops : 

 The reason of this hasty transplanting, is to prevent 

 their obstinate and deep rooting ; tantus amor terra 



which makes them hard to be taken up 



when they grow older, and that being removed, they 

 take no great hold till the second year, after which, 

 they come away amain ; yet I have planted them of 

 five and six inches diameter, which have thriven as 

 well as the smaller wands. You may accelerate their 

 springing by laying the keys in sand, and some moist 

 fine earth s. s. s. but lay them not too thick, or 

 double, and in a cover'd, though airy place for a 

 winter, before you sow them ; and the second year 

 they will come away mainly ; so you weed, trim and 

 cleanse them. Cut not his head at all (which being 

 young, is pithy) nor, by any means the fibrous part 

 of the roots ; only that down-right, or taproot (which 

 gives our husbandmen so much trouble in drawing) 

 is to be totally abated : But this work ought to be in 

 the increase of October, or November, and not in the 

 Spring. We are (as I told you) willing to spare his 

 head rather than the side branches (which whilst 

 young, may be cut close) because being yet young, it 

 is but of a spungy substance ; but being once well 

 fixed, you may cut him as close to the earth as you 

 please ; it will cause him to shoot prodigiously, so as 

 in a few years to be fit for pike-staves ; whereas if you 

 take him wild out of the forest, you must of necessity 

 strike off the head, which much impairs it. Hedge- 

 row ashes may the oftner be decapitated, and shew 

 their heads again sooner than other trees so us'd. 

 Young ashes are sometimes in winter frost-burnt, 

 black as coals, and then to use the knife is seasonable, 

 though they do commonly recover of themselves 



