1824 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



These returns, which are possible when the trees have been well cultivated, 

 justify the common saying in France that poplar ought to produce one franc per 

 tree annually. The price given in the table is often exceeded where the trees are 

 of good size and in a favourable situation. Twenty-five to thirty francs per cubic 

 metre is a common price, as I was informed by M. Marion at Pontvallain. M. 

 Breton-Bonnard says that in 1900 the poplars of the valley of the Ourcq, near 

 Paris, were sold at fifty francs per cubic metre and upwards ; and he knew a case 

 where a landowner took a meadow on a thirty years' lease, planted it with poplars, 

 and, after paying the rent with the hay 1 and grazing, was able, by cutting down the 

 trees before the end of his lease, to buy the land with the profit. 



I certainly know of land in England, which could be bought at ^10 per acre or 

 less, that would produce in forty to fifty years poplars containing an average of 100 

 cubic ft., and if there were only thirty trees to the acre, and the price sixpence per 

 foot, this would amount to 3000 cubic ft., worth j$ per acre. 



According to Mathey, 2 the timbers of the different poplars may be distinguished 

 as follows : 



A. Species in which the heart- and sap-wood are confused. 



Black and Lombardy Poplars. Heart-wood with black veins in old trees. 

 Black, Italian, and other Hybrid Poplars. Heart-wood uniformly white 

 or slightly reddish. 



B. Species in which the heart- and sap-wood are distinct. 



White Poplar. Sap-wood white ; heart-wood distinctly reddish. 

 Grey Poplar. Sap-wood reddish ; heart-wood reddish-brown. 



C. Aspen. Heart- and sap-wood confused in trees growing in the forests of the 



plain ; heart-wood distinct and vinous red in trees growing on the hills 

 and mountains. (H. J. E.) 



POPULUS REGENERATA 



Populus regeneraia, Schneider, Laubholzkunde, i. 7 (1904). 



Peuplier riginiri, Carriere, in Rev. Hort. 1865, pp. 58 and 276 ; Lambin, in Rev. Hort. 1873, p. 47. 



Populus canadensis, var. grandifolia, Dieck, Nacht. Haupt. Verz. Zosc/un, 1887, p. 16. 



A tree of hybrid origin (cf. p. 181 5), resembling P. serotina in branchlets and 

 foliage, but bearing pistillate flowers, and unfolding its leaves about a fortnight earlier. 

 Pistillate catkins similar to those of P. marilandica, but with usually only two stigmas. 



This hybrid, according to Carriere, originated in 18 14 in the nursery of M. 

 Michie at Arcueil near Paris, and was apparently a seedling of unknown origin, 



1 Balzac, Vie de Province, i. 255 (1855) gives calculations by Eugenie Grandet, showing that the loss of hay, due to 

 the shade of the poplars which he had planted in lines on good grass land on the banks of the Loire, near Saumur, was not 

 made up by the proceeds of the sale of their timber, if compound interest was allowed. Grandet drew the conclusion, not 

 generally accepted in France, that poplars could only be grown at a profit on poor soil. A correspondent in the Gard. Chron. 

 1855, p. 102, states that near Diss in Norfolk, 336 black Italian poplars, which were planted at intervals between 1819 and 

 1822, were sold in 1854 for ^124. They grew on an area of 4J acres; and whilst the trees were standing, the pasture 

 beneath them was let at five shillings an acre. This tree grows in low, marshy, boggy land, where almost every other species 

 ceases to thrive. A. H. 



s Traiti <T Exploitation Commerciale des Bois, i. 23 (1906). 



