II. YORKSHIRE, 251 



4rieji of foils : an opinion founded on his own 

 experience. The fummers of Eighty-five and 

 Eighty-fix were very dry i the plantation 

 made little progrefs, and the area was un- 

 productive. This year (1787) the fummer 

 has been mqlft ; — the tjrees and the grafs are 

 equally luxuriant. 



MooRY SOIL, when perfectly dry, repels 

 water like a dry fpunge-, but, like this, 

 when once it is faturated with moifture, it re- 

 tains it lonjrer than common earth does. 



o 



But a moor, effedlually drained, and placed 

 gbove the level of collected moifture, is not 

 readily filled v/ith water ; it may therefore 

 be juftly ranked among the drieji foils. 



This accounts for the rapid progrefs which 

 the BIRCH and the Scotch fir (both of 

 them mountain plants) have made in thcfe 

 plantations. In the drier parts they are more 

 than twenty feet high ; far outftrlppingr 

 ^very other fpecies ; except 



The Norway srpuce, which, for the 

 firft ten or twelve years atleaft, thrives vigor- 

 oufly. But fome plants of this fpecies, plant- 

 ed fourteen or fifteen years ago, are getting 

 Tagged, and appear to be in an unthriving 



ftatp. 



