52 PLANTING. 



last twenty-five years, in different counties ; and T 

 venture to assert that these plantations will bear com- 

 parison with any plantations in our country that have 

 been planted on new soils of equal quality." 



Mr M'Corquodale's position and experience well 

 entitle him to speak on such a subject with much 

 authority, and it will be found that what he states 

 as the actual results of his experiments are perfectly 

 in accordance with facts. 



With all due deference, however, to his theory re- 

 garding the wood-beetle's depredations, I am certain it 

 will be found that the beetle only attacks unhealthy 

 plants and not healthy ones, and the producing cause 

 of the dishealth is that of planting in the old effete 

 vegetable matter. This is even borne out by what Mr 

 M'Corquodale states, both in regard to herbage burning 

 and egg-destroying by fire, and by turning up fresh soil, 

 either in the form of pitting, as clearly described, or by 

 using the excavations from the drains or other alterna- 

 tive of borrowing a little soil to lay round the plant : 

 any or all of these expedients may safely be adopted, 

 and the results will be found equally satisfactory in 

 them all. It is of small moment how the old sur- 

 face is cleaned, if only it is so, and the plant kept 

 clear of it, so as not to vitiate the health of the 

 plant. Where the surface can be thoroughly burnt, 

 and thereby cleaned and sweetened, no better or 

 cheaper plan can be adopted ; but where this cannot 

 be effected I prefer draining and using the excavations ; 

 but my system in doing so is first to pare off the turf 

 where the plant is to stand, and by adding a spadeful 

 of the excavations the surface is thereby not only 

 brought up to the level of the surrounding ground, 



