46 Quercus on Steuarfs Planter's, Guide. 



Art. IX. Remarks on Sir Henry Steuarfs Planter's Guide. 

 By Quercus. 



Sir, 

 Since the able review of Sir Henry Steuart's Planter's 

 Guide by Mr. Main (Vol. IV. p. 1 15.), I have seen the work : 

 t contains more egotism than might have been expected. I 

 will make a few remarks on the manner Sir Henry speaks of 

 the capabilities of gardeners and wood-foresters, in respect of 

 their knowledge in the transplanting of large forest trees. In 

 the preface he says : — " The gardener knows little about work 

 without the walls of the garden ; the wood-forester is only a 

 mere lopper or cutter of wood." Gentlemen themselves are 

 to blame for not having woodmen or planters whose practice 

 combines science also. It is no uncommon sight to see some 

 old domestic, such as has been coachman or groom formerly, 

 or perhaps the cart and plough wright, having the manage- 

 ment of the plantations, and that, too, on pretty extensive 

 estates. Such men may do to report a broken fence, if they 

 cannot mend it ; or they may report to their employer such 

 and such people for carrying away brushwood, &c. : but they 

 know as little about the thinning for the future welfare of the 

 plantations, or the proper method of planting, so as to pro- 

 duce such and such effects, according to the local situation of 

 the ground and surrounding scenery, as an old tailor would 

 do who had never been without the walls of a city. Let noble- 

 men and gentlemen give the same rate of wages to a first-rate 

 planter as they would do to a first-rate gardener, and engage 

 none who cannot give some proofs of their knowledge in the 

 different parts of forest management, and of the value of full- 

 grown timber, together with their capability to harmonise the 

 plantations or grounds to be planted with the surrounding 

 scenery. I say, let such, and such qualifications only, be the 

 means of obtaining respectable situations, and then Sir Henry 

 Steuart will see wood-foresters capable of doing something 

 more than lopping off a bough, or cutting down a tree. But 

 as I am one of those beings denominated a mere lopper or cut- 

 ter of wood, I must tell Sir Henry that I have transplanted 

 trees of from 10 to 16 ft. high, without any machine, and not 

 above one in sixty died. The trees were carried about a mile 

 on a low wood-waggon, two, and sometimes three, at one time. 

 After digging well round the tree and below the roots, I made 

 the balls be reduced with a pick (taking care of the small 

 fibrous roots), so that six or eight men could lift them to the 

 waggon with a large hand-barrow. 



