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Colonel Pickerings on Hedges* 



Read September 14, 1813. 



Wenhamy Mass. August 13, 1813. 



Dear Sir, 



In the 2d volume of the Memoirs of the Philadel- 

 phia Society for Promoting Agriculture, is published 

 the letter I wrote you from Washington, in 1809, on 

 the subject of hedges. As you are printing a third 

 volume, I wish, in this communication, to correct two 

 errors in that letter, in which I refer to Lord Kaims 

 and Dr. James Anderson, on the same subject. 



Thorn Hedges. 



Expressing my doubts, from what I had read, 

 whether the English thorn-hedges constituted com- 

 plete fences ; especially as it seemed to be a common 

 practice to introduce trees into them ; I then mention- 

 ed Lord Kaims as ** expressly saying, that he never 

 saw a good hedge in England." Not having his book 

 (The Gentleman Farmer) by me, I trusted to my re- 

 collection. This I afterwards found, as to the precise 

 terms used, to be incorrect. Lord Kaims says — 

 *' there never was a good thorn hedge with trees in it ;" 

 and that *' in England there is scarce a thorn-fence to 

 be seen without a hedge-row of trees ; and these 

 hedge-rows (of trees) have been the destruction of 

 fences.'' Your own observation on English hedges, 

 which you had seen, corresponded with the idea I had 



