228 SYLVA BOOK ii 



be forc'd to cut off, it were safe to sear with an hot 

 iron, and prevent the danger of bleeding, to which 

 they are obnoxious even to destruction, though unseen, 

 and unheeded : Neither may you disbranch them, 

 but with great caution, as about March, or before, or 

 else in September, and then 'tis best to prune up the 

 side-branches close to the trunk, cutting off all that 

 are above a year old ; if you suffer them too long, 

 they grow too big, and the cicatrice will be more apt 

 to spend the tree in gum ; upon which accident, 

 I advise you to rub over their wounds with a mixture 

 of cow-dung ; the neglect of this cost me dear, so 

 apt are they to spend their gum. Indeed, the fir and 

 pine seldom out-live their being lopp'd. Some advise 

 us to break the shells of pines to facilitate their 

 delivery, and I have essay'd, but to my loss ; nature 

 does obstetricate, and do that office of her self, when 

 it is the proper season ; neither does this preparation 

 at all prevent those which are so buried, whilst their 

 hard integuments protect them both from rotting, 

 and the vermin. 



Pinastes, the domestic pine grows very well with 

 us, both in mountains and plains ; but the pinaster, 

 or wilder (of which are four sorts) best for walks ; 

 pulcherrima in hortis, (as already we have said) because 

 it grows tall and proud, maintaining their branches 

 at the sides, which the other pine does less frequently. 

 There is in New-England, a very broad pine, which 

 increases to a wonderful bulk and magnitude, inso- 

 much as large canoos have been excavated out of the 

 body of it, without any addition. But beside these 

 large and gigantick pines, there is the spinet, with 

 sharp thick bristles, yielding a rosin or liquor odorous, 

 and useful in carpentary-work. 



