APPLICATION OF SIMPLE COPPICE. 127 



hurtful grasses ; but it destroys at the same time 

 the vegetable mould, as also the few acorns and 

 young seedlings, which the coppice poles were able to 

 produce. From the forester's point of view, the 

 greatest advantage is to be found in the working up 

 of the soil, by which it is loosened and earth collected 

 round the stools. As these latter were cut down to 

 the very ground, they now find themselves below the 

 surface of the soil, and the shoots which spring up 

 have thus a solid base, and at the same time strike 

 root directly. 



After the cereal crop is gathered in, a remarkable 

 phenomenon takes place. A vast quantity of broom 

 makes its appearance, the seeds of which, from 

 having been preserved underground, escaped the 

 action of the fire. They grow rapidly, and are not 

 long in forming with the oak shoots a dense thicket. 

 If they are not extracted the very first year of their 

 growth, it is a mistake to get rid of them wholesale 

 all at once, because the oaks, being drawn up and 

 still only of small girth, could not stand alone. 



The presence of this broom is often more useful 

 than injurious. It protects the shoots from the cold 

 north wind, which has nothing to check it on the 

 exposed plateaux of the Ardennes. Formerly a 

 curtain of big trees used to be left around each 

 cutting as a protection against the wind ; but these 

 curtains have been cut down, and have not been 

 renewed. The result is that the coppice is in 

 danger of disappearing altogether on the higher 

 points. Some of these places have been planted up 

 with the Scotch pine and the spruce fir. Their 



