40 CULTURE OF THE MARITIME PINE. 



"The moving sand striking against this is stopped, and it gradually 

 fills up all the intervals, and forms thus a slope with two sides. In 

 proportion as the dune rises, care is taken to raise, from time to time, 

 all the bundles of the four ranks until it is judged that the dune is 

 sufiiciently elevated to protect the sowings on the adjacent zone. 



" The costs of the two are about the same ; but the latter lasts 

 longer, and is more easily maintained. Nevertheless, the former is 

 perferred for points on which the wind acts with more force and 

 violence." 



Of the sowing, M. Courreges reports — 



" They sow by hand broad cast 16 kilogrammes (about 351bs.) of 

 pine seed, and 7 kilogrammes (15| lbs.) of broom seed to the acre, 

 sowing the one after the other, because, being of different weights, 

 they would be ill sown if they were mixed. 



"They immediately cover up the surface sown with brushwood, 

 composed of heather, whins, and other bushes, laid with the root to 

 the wind, that they may be less easily raised by the action of the 

 wind, and fixity is given to the covering by loading it with some 

 shovelfuls of sand. 



" Branches of the pine are little esteemed as a covering, because 

 they very soon become despoiled of the leaves with which they are 

 clothed. 



" When the covering up of the ground is completed, it is well to 

 cast over it 4 or 5 kilogrammes (9 or 10 lbs.) of pine seed, which 

 falling between the branches, may come to replace seeds buried to 

 too great a depth by the treading of the workmen. 



" The broom and the maritime pine appear above the sand about 

 the same time, but the broom developes more rapidly, and soon covers, 

 with its shade, the young pines, the vegetation of which shows itself 

 pretty promptly and pretty vigorously under the protecting shelter." 



In the Landes they value the cork oak, and not without reason, 

 because of its product, and it is often grown along with the maritime 

 pine, under the shade and shelter of which it grows up erect, yielding 

 its bark in good condition for sale, whereas otherwise it is apt to be- 

 come bushy. It is sown in a similar way two years after the sowing 

 of the pine. 



In some cases, but not generally, pines produced by natural sowing 

 on marshy land, are cut out with a sod of such size as to contain all 

 the rootlets, and planted in holes dug for them of the same size, with 



