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retentive sub-soil. That it will grow there rapidly and luxu- 

 riantly is amply proved, but its history for many centuries 

 shows that elevated lands suit it better than low grounds, and 

 side-hills and mountain slopes better than flats. In the rich 

 river flats of Kew Gardens and in the vicinity of London the 

 larch does not thrive. The specimens found in that remarka- 

 ble collection of all known trees are puny. The Kew arborist 

 informed me that in the two hundred and seventy acres appro- 

 priated to the arboretum, no spot had been found suited to the 

 larch. 



No other tree has been planted so extensively in Scotland. 

 It attains maturity long before the oak, and serves well for 

 nearly all purposes for which oak is used. Larch trees thirty 

 years old are sometimes sold for fifteen dollars each, while oaks 

 of the same age are not worth three dollars each. As the 

 larch grows erect, with short and slender laterals, it may be 

 planted much thicker than the oak. According to Loudon, 

 ten acres of larch will furnish as much ship timber as seventy- 

 five acres of oak. Its large timber yield per acre is one source 

 of its popularity in Britain. It was first planted on the estate of 

 the Duke of Athole, in 1741. Some stately specimens nearly 

 one hundred and -forty years old may be seen near the cathe- 

 dral at Dunkeld. Mr. McGregor, the duke's forester, informed 

 me that on this one estate have been planted over twenty- 

 seven millions of larch trees, covering over sixteen thousand 

 acres, some of which was formerly worth only from one to two 

 shillings per acre. Dr. James Brown says he has seen matured 

 crops of larch of sixty-five years' standing sold for from $750 

 to. $2,000 per acre, when the land was originally worth only 

 from $2 to $4 per acre. 



The reclamation of marshes by drainage, both surface and 

 subsoil, has been carried on for so long a period and on so 

 broad a scale and with such grand results as to need no de- 

 tailed discussion here. England, Ireland and Holland, to 

 name no other countries of Europe, contain millions of acres 

 of such land, now reclaimed and exceedingly fertile. Even 

 lakes from ten to fifteen miles in length have been drained. 

 In 1848 was completed the draining of the Lake of Haarlem 

 in Holland. The lands thus recovered have since been sold 



