48 The Pyracantha, or evergreen-thotiu 



ditching, than the hedge- thorn, as the short row which 

 I raised from layers now sufficiently evinces. Being 

 anxious to save every sprig of it for the sake of seed, 

 I never trimmed it until last year, when I cut it down 

 to about four feet from the surface. It is now up- 

 wards of nine feet in height, and presents a close, 

 strong and commanding aspect of defence, affording a 

 handsome specimen of accidental hedging, naturally 

 interwoven, without splashing, training or trimming, 

 except the once cutting down as mentioned. 



On a view of the ditched portion of my Pyracantha 

 hedge, the consequence is easy to be perceived ; the 

 flexible undergrowth of the plants will lean down and 

 serve to defend the face of the ditch from the effects 

 of frosts. In a free soil, they will reach the bottom, 

 where the extremities of the sprays will sometimes, 

 in situations nearly level, be covered by the sediment 

 which they will serve to arrest in the time of rain, and 

 taking root from thence, send up in process of time a 

 new offspring of shoots, strong or weak, according as 

 the nature of the soil may be more or less favourable 

 for their nourishment : and where stagnant water is 

 not too long retained in the ditch to injure them. This 

 it is evident will take place in favourable situations. 

 But although this will not always be the result, it is 

 beyond doubt, that in forming the bank close by the 

 back of the hedge, numbers of the extremities of the 

 limbs and sprigs will be covered up in the earth, and 

 will there certainly take root and surmount the top of 

 the bank with new embattled ranks of eminent resist- 

 ance ; so that the whole exterior face of the work will 

 in time be covered with a double or treble range of 



