of Selborne 241 



succeeded ; but from that day the air became entirely 

 clear ; and the heat of the sun about noon had a consider- 

 able influence in sheltered situations. 



It was in such an aspect that the snow on the author's 

 evergreens was melted every day, and frozen intensely 

 every night ; so that the laurustines, bays, laurels, and 

 arbutuses looked, in three or four days, as if they had been 

 burnt in the fire ; while a neighbour's plantation of the 

 same kind, in a high cold situation, where the snow was 

 never melted at all, remained uninjured. 



From hence I would infer that it is the repeated melt- 

 ing and freezing of the snow that is so fatal to vegetation, 

 rather than the severity of the cold. Therefore it highly 

 behoves every planter, who wishes to escape the cruel mor- 

 tification of losing in a few days the labour and hopes of 

 years, to bestir himself on such emergencies ; and, if his 

 plantations are small, to avail himself of mats, cloths, 

 pease-haum, straw, reeds, or any such covering, for a 

 short time ; or, if his shrubberies are extensive, to see that 

 his people go about with prongs and forks, and carefully 

 dislodge the snow from the boughs, since the naked 

 foliage will shift much better for itself, than where the 

 snow is partly melted and frozen again. 



It may perhaps appear at first like a paradox ; but 

 doubtless the more tender trees and shrubs should never 

 be planted in hot aspects ; not only for the reason 

 assigned above, but also because, thus circumstanced, 

 they are disposed to shoot earlier in the spring, and grow 

 on later in the autumn than they would otherwise do, 

 and so are sufferers by lagging or early frosts. For this 

 reason also plants from Siberia will hardly endure our 

 climate : because, on the very first advances of spring, 

 they shoot away, and so are cut off by the severe nights 

 of March or April. 



Dr. Fothergill and others have experienced the same 

 inconvenience with respect to the more tender shrubs 

 from North America ; which they therefore plant under 

 north walls. There should also perhaps be a wall to the 

 east to defend them from the piercing blasts from that 

 quarter. 



