BRITISH FOREST TREES 273 



its toughness and its adaptability to machinery requirements 

 and cogs of wheels, and for its great heating power as fuel, 

 than for any of its other qualities as timber. It is more the 

 denizen of the valleys and the lower uplands than of the 

 higher hill-ranges, which it cannot ascend so far as the 

 beech. It is principally found in groups or patches, or as 

 individual trees interspersed among beech along with oak, 

 lime, ash, and Scots pine on moist patches of soil. 



Tree-form and Root system. On thoroughly congenial 

 soil and situation, the growth of the hornbeam closely 

 resembles that of the beech in regard to tree-form and 

 development of the stem, and when there grown in close 

 canopy, it attains to equal height and symmetry of bole, 

 the ramification of the branches beginning also at about 

 the same height as in the case of the beech. Single stems 

 grown in the open on strong, fresh soil attain a height and 

 girth in no way inferior to the beech. 



The hornbeam is, however, as a rule relegated to soils of 

 only inferior, or at least average, quality, and there its 

 development sinks rapidly to very indifferent proportions, 

 the bole becoming short and tapering, with a very irregular, 

 fluted and flanged section, and soon dividing into branches 

 that ramify into numerous clusters of broom-like twigs with 

 somewhat dense foliage forming an extensive crown. 

 Under such circumstances the hornbeam hardly approaches 

 the majority of our forest trees in regard to attainable 

 proportions, seldom exceeding sixty to seventy feet in height 

 and about three feet in girth, whilst on the poorer qualities 

 of soil it assumes rather the form of shrub or bush than of 

 a normally developed tree. Growth in close canopy is 

 necessary to secure a straight bole ; with enlargement of 

 growing-space the tendency to ramification soon manifests 

 itself. 



Its root-system is endowed with a considerable power of 



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