50 OF FENCES, AND GATES. 



filled up, and no more ground is occupied, than that which 

 is taken up by the hedge. 



These hedges are planted in single rows at the distance 

 of four inches from each other; and at every three yards' 

 distance, a plant of oak, elm, beech, or other valuable wood 

 is inserted, for a hedge-row. The thorns are purchased 

 when seedlings, and trained up in a nursery upon the estate, 

 for two or three years before they are transplanted into the 

 fences. By this process they are naturalized to the soil and 

 the climate.* 



By this means the expence of a paling, for defending the 

 hedges, and the vexation of having that paling destroyed or 

 stolen, which must often happen in populous districts, where 

 wood is scarce, are prevented. 



These modes of fencing adopted by Mr Forbes, have 

 been carried on, not on a trifling or unimportant, but upon 

 a great scale; for constructing the fences on the Callander 

 estate, no less a number than six millions of thorns have 

 been planted, and the line of these fences measures about 

 four hundred miles in length. The trees of various kinds 

 planted in the hedge-rows, amount to above 200,000. 



If a farm is inclosed by thorn-hedges, and under the 



* See Dr Graham's most valuable Survey of the County of Stirling, 

 p. 123. It has been observed on this plan, that the thorns should be 

 planted at nine inches and even a foot, instead of only four inches dis- 

 tance from each other. The celebrated Bakewell, and even before him 

 Mr Ralph Ward of Guisborough in Yorkshire, above 60 years ago, found, 

 by repeated trials, that half a yard was the proper distance for quicks. 

 The closer they are planted, the more they die off: and it is well known 

 that any quick hedge, 20 or SO years old, is in that proportion, few of 

 the thorns being nearer than half a yard from each other. When plant- 

 ed about a foot however, they make more wood, and become sooner a 

 strong and lasting fence. 



