AND GARDENER'S JOURNAL. 



^^^aa-^^aiJ'^iaAIS.a 



(From the North American Review.) 



AMEIUCAIV FOREST TREES. 



(Concliiiletl.) 



The public attention is, of late, we hope, more 

 alive than it lias hecii, to the value of our forest.s, 

 and to the necessity of economizing what yet re- 

 tnaiiis of these i-icii national treasures, anti of re- 

 placing what has been so carelessly wasteil. This 

 necessity is every day making itself more mani- 

 fi.st. Fuel has already become scarce in our sea- 

 p '-. or rather on our whole seacoast ; a fact 

 worthy the serious consiileralion of those, who re- 

 flect that the sufli-'rlngs of tlic poor, from tlie want 

 of this article, are probably greater than from all 

 other causes united. Our best timber also is he- 

 coming more and more costly, and our civil and 

 naval arcliiteiits are constantly driven to tlie em- 

 ployment of that of inferior quality. The live 

 Oiik of the Southern States is already procured for 

 our Navy Yards wiili great difficulty, and in fifty 

 years will probably disappear from our soil ; and 

 our own white oak, as well as our other most val- 

 ualile timber trees, must follow at no very distant 

 ))eriod. It is in the power of every one who pos- 

 sesses a few acres of land, to do much to arrest 

 this mighty evil ; aiul what might not be antici- 

 pated from a simultaneous .effort on the part of 

 cultivators in onrconunon wealth, or even in a sin- 

 gle county ? And all this, at the expense, on the 

 part of each individual, of a few slidiings of mon- 

 ey ami a few hours of interesting l.ihor. If we 

 owe any thing to posterity, in what way could 

 we confer on iheni so great, a benefit at so cheap 

 n rate? 



It is not, however, strictly true, or rather it is 

 not thev\hiile truth, to say with Virgil, that he 

 who plants benefits his remote posterity. A friend 

 of ours once observed, that those who set out for- 

 est trees, reminded him of the student, who, on 

 hearing that a crow woidd live for a century, 

 bought a young one, for the sake of watching the 

 experiment. As a stroke of humor, this remark 

 is privileged from criticism ; but as a statement of 

 facts, it iiiuShe received with much qualification. 

 It is no uncommon circumstance to find oaks of 

 twenty years' growth, of more than a foot in di- 

 ameter, anil of forty or fifty feet in height ; and 

 we have seen an English willow of only double 

 that age, measuring at several feet frotn the ground, 

 more than sevi.'ti yanls in circumference. Were 

 planting commenced at tlie time when our young 

 men usually enter on their professions, or their 

 business, how many might live to enjoy the shade 

 of majestic groves of their own raising! 



These remarks may derive some additional in- 

 terest from the fact, that a taste for rural occupa- 

 tions is rapidly springing up and extending itself 

 in our large cities, and that objects ot thi.s des- 

 cription are gradually absorbing more and more 

 of the capital as well as the intelligence, of that 

 portion of our community. Where indeed could ' 



they find a sr)urce of entertainment more pure, 

 more copion.s, or more beneficial to themselves or 

 their fellow citizens ? To .say nolhing of the val- 

 ue of forest trees for what are strictly denoniina- 

 teil useful purposes, let us ask in whit way any 

 indiviilual among us can do more to decorate and 

 beantily the couniry. How many millions have 

 been devoted in this, as well as in other commu- 

 nities, to architecture, and yet how little have the 

 results corresponded to the time, the effort, atiil 

 the money so expended ! For one chaste and 

 magnificent edifice, we have ten irregular and 

 disproportioned piles, countenancing, and almost 

 justifying, the sweeping remark of a French au- 

 thor, that the Genius of architecture had shed its 

 inal.^diction on America. But lie who rears a 

 stately grove or avenue, bestows an ornament on 

 his native land, which none hut a Vandal would 

 wish to destroy. How much has been doice in 

 this city.aiid its heauiiful ciiviroiis, by the taste 

 anil public spirit of a few individuals ! To pass 

 over numerous otluu' instances, we are indebted 

 to one of former days, as we have already observ- 

 ed, for the chief ornament of Uostoii, the triple 

 colonnade of weeping elms in the jflall ; and it is 

 owing to the good taste of another accomplished 

 individual of the present day, that the majestic, or 

 as we may now irall them, the sacred groves of 

 .Mount Auburn, were rescued from the woodman's 

 axe. 



It is not merely, however, to tiiose who are or 

 may he practically engaged in the propagation or 

 preservation of forest trees, though these we hope 

 are not few, that our remarks are directed. Though 



sonal intercourse, if not the only, is certainly the 

 cliief means, by which the inhabitants of the dif- 

 ferent States of our widely-extended L'nion may 

 he enabled to acquire a proper knowledge of the 

 wants and the character of each other, and above 

 all to cherish those ifeelings of regard, so essential 

 to the prosperity, if not the exisieiice of our na- 

 tion. The press, however great the obligations 

 we owe it, is of necessity always an imperfect 

 and sometimes an unfaithful mirror of public sen- 

 timent ; and it is to personal intercourse, and to 

 the spirit of mutual fairness and friendship, which 

 such intercourse will assuredly generate, that we 

 must look to su|q)ly the deficiences, and correct 

 the aberrations, of that mighty fugine of good' and 

 of evil. It were to he wished, indeed, that the 

 practice of travelling extensively in our own coun- 

 try were often pursued, at least as a preliminary 

 to an Eurojieaittour. We should not find in that 

 case, as we think we now do in some instances, 

 the most incorrect representations of the charac- 

 ter and manners of our pofnilation, proceeding 

 from the pens of our own tourists in other conn- 

 tries. To tiiany of onr Iiest-edncated and mo.st 

 accomplished men, the interior of other States, if 

 not of their own, is a Terra Incognilia, and thi's 

 too hi spite of those facilities of communication, 

 which exist in the United States, to a greaSer de- 

 gree than in almost any portion of the oht world. 

 We need not state how thinly this country is peo- 

 pled in comparison with any other in an equal 

 state of a(iv micment, nor repeat, how large a por- 

 tion of those wide spaces which separate our priu 

 cipal settlements li-om each other, is covered with 



comparatively a small number may be the plant- magnificent forests. The traveller, who can rel- 



ish the heaiuies of tliese splendid collections of 

 vegetable wonders, can have few intervals of idle- 

 ness or weariness. 



Yet however valuable we may consider a tasts 

 for these prominent beauties of our own scenery, 

 merely as a never-failing source of occupation 

 and enjoyment, there are still other reasons of the 

 highest ninment, why such a taste should he anx- 

 iously cherished ; we mean as one of the princi- 

 pal sources of an ardent and deep felt patriotism. 

 We trust that our country has, in the view of all 

 of us, other qualities than the beauties of our nat- 

 ural scenery, lo recommend herto her proper rank 

 in our estimation. There is in her institiitiony, 

 political, intellectual and religious, more than 

 enough to justify ns in the preference which we 

 give to our native land over all olhers. 15iit pat- 

 riotism, wherever it has existed in a high degree, 

 has been, we apjirehend, a sentiment, as well as a 

 principle, ami is sometliing more than a cold "feel- 

 ing of preference. It is in truth an emotion of a 

 complex ciiaracter, and if we would cherish to- 

 wards our country an enthusiastic attachment, we 

 should not suffer ourselves to be blind to those 

 charms, whether of nature or of art, which may 

 reco.nmend her to our faneyi »« "cH "S our sober 

 judgment. \\'liy should not the mind of an Auier- 

 ican think upon those majestic forests, whose beau, 

 ediy be considered as any thing but wasted. Per- ' tiea are commemorated throughout the civilized 



ers or the owners of groves or of gardens, all may 

 be admirers of forest scenery. For the indulgence 

 of such a taste we have the highest intellectual 

 authority. "A tree in full leaf," says Lord Ba- 

 con, " is a nobler object than a king in his coro- 

 nation robes." Hut it is in a conimuiiily like our 

 own, above all olhers, that a taste for the beaii- 

 tie.-i of forest trees, as well as an acqiia ntance 

 with their nature and uses, should be carefully 

 cultivated. It is siifiicient to recommend it, that 

 it furnishes a never-failing source of occupation 

 and amusement to those who travel in this country, 

 and a strong additional inducement to the general 

 adoption of this practice, so essential and at the 

 same time so neglected. Is it not a fact that a 

 large proportion of those among us, who enjoy 

 the leisure and the means for visiting other re- 

 gions, confine their researches exclusively to Eu- 

 rope ; and if it be so, is it altogether creditable td 

 our good taste, to say notliing more ? How far 

 the practice of travelling in other countries may 

 be advisable, is a question we do not intend to 

 agitate, though we are convinced, after some re- 

 flection and experience, that its advantages have 

 been astonishingly overrated. But while years 

 are frequently employed in exploring the Euro- 

 pean continent, a few months spent in visiting the 

 most iiHerestin<' portions of our own, must aisur- 



