288 EFFECTS OF TREATING 



nature, in every way in which nature can bear upon 

 the point at issue. 



Imported oak has been blamed for this decay, and 

 it is true that the imported oak, and more especially 

 the oak imported from America, is inferior to the 

 oak which once grew in the forests of England. But 

 the deterioration is not confined to the imported 

 oak; and however bad that may be, it could not 

 inoculate the oaks of the forest with its deleterious 

 qualities, any more than the species of insect called 

 American blight, which infests apple-trees, could 

 take its departure for Hereford or Devon, imme- 

 diately on the landing of a cargo of American apples 

 at Liverpool. The rot is in the timber itself, that 

 is of an inferior quality ; and the cause why it has 

 been allowed to degenerate is, that they by whom 

 oak-trees have been bred have not been careful in 

 the observation of nature, but have proceeded in then 

 operations by means that had no natural foundation 

 The object of the grower has been to get goodly 

 trees trees that pleased the eye, without any regard 

 to the quality of the timber ; and the object of the 

 nurseryman has been to rear up his seedlings and 

 get them to market as soon and in as showy a con- 

 dition as possible. 



It has been said that the wrong oak has been 

 cultivated, and that may be true, for the very same 

 circumstances which led to the wrong mode of 

 treatment may have led to the using of the wrong 

 plant. The collector of acorns would naturally 

 proceed upon the joint principles of "the most 

 easily obtained and the most saleable." I do not 

 know that it is in all cases a positive fact, that the 

 worst kinds of oak are the most prolific of acorns ; 

 but it is a sort of generally-observed law among vege- 

 tables, that where there is a great deal of fruit, the 

 wood is soft and perishable. And that has reason 

 on its side ; trees do not work miracles any more 

 than men do ; and, therefore, if their action is more 

 turned in any particular direction, it must be less in 



