46 ESSEX SOCIETY. 



hausted, with acorns ; when the young trees were two or three 

 inches high, he ploughed and hoed as in a field of Indian corn : 

 the trees grew to the astonishment of the whole neighborhood, 

 and, in less than forty years, were ripe for the axe. About a 

 century since, there was an experiment in this town, in planting 

 the white oak for ship-timber, the success of which ought to 

 have encouraged frequent repetition. The grove was in cutting 

 for timber thirty years since, and a man between seventy and 

 eighty years old told me that, in his boyhood, he assisted in 

 planting those trees. It is not, to the existing generation, so hope- 

 less an undertaking as some would represent it, to plant forest 

 trees — even those of slow growth. I recollect measuring the 

 circumference of an oak tree in West Newbury, the acorn of 

 which was planted by Benjamin Poore, who is yet comparative- 

 ly a young man, and think it measured twenty-seven inches ; it 

 was a well-proportioned handsome tree. Had he planted, at the 

 same time, fifteen acres of similar soil, it would have become, be- 

 fore now, an inexhaustible wood-lot for the use of one family. 

 The gentleman who has made the donation to your society, pos- 

 sibly may be regarded by some as an air-castle builder ; but if 

 the association are faithful in carrying out his views, of which 

 there is no doubt, it will, in less than thirty years, appear that 

 he has been the efficient instrument in raising into the ait mul- 

 titudes of beautiful and useful trees, and thus meeting what will 

 ere long become a pressing want in the community. 



Respectfully, 



Your Obt. Servant, 



MORRILL ALLEN. 



To John W. Proctor, Esq. 



Essay on the Cultivation of the Onion. 



BY JOHN W. PROCTOR. 



The culture of onions has increased so much, within a few 

 years, in this vicinity, that it has become one of the staple prod- 



