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SECTION VIII. 



TAKING-UP, AND TRANSPORTATION OF THE TREES. 



If there be any one thing more than another in the re- 

 moval of trees, that places the superiority of the preservative 

 system in a striking point of view, it is the management of 

 the roots. Few planters, in the taking-up of trees, make 

 much account of roots, provided that a large mass or ball of 

 earth only adhere to them. Marshall, one of the most ju- 

 dicious writers who has treated the subject, in giving direc- 

 tions on this point, says, that the length of the roots, properly 

 speaking, should not be less than the fourth part of the 

 whole height of the tree ; although probably, from a want 

 of the means of extricating them from the soil, he did not 

 contemplate the possibility of applying the rule to trees of 

 any magnitude. Had he been better acquainted with vege- 

 table physiology, he would have seen, that by the law of 

 nature, roots and branches must, in every case, be relative 

 and correlative, and that the standard of judging with re- 

 spect to roots is not the height of the plant, but the actual 

 length of the side-branches. If we mean that our subjects 

 should fully possess the protecting properties, in respect to 

 those two important conservative organs, they must possess 

 them relatively in such proportions, as nature confers on all 

 trees, which are found to thrive in open exposures. 



Roots spread themselves in the ground, in a way nearly 



* See Rural Ornament, Vol. I. p. 367. 

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