178 Rot in the Larch. 



these, I pass that part of Mr. Bishop's letter, that Mr. Smith 

 may not suspect us of poaching on his manor.) 



" The best locust tree in the country is thought to be at 

 Myginch Castle, Carse of Gowrie; girthing, at 4 ft. from the 

 ground, 5 ft. 8 in." (I understand its age is reckoned to be 

 between forty and fifty years.) 



" There are three Portugal laurels at Inverary, brought from 

 Portugal, by Duke Archibald, in 1695. The largest spreads 

 over a circle of 165 ft. circumference, and is nearly 40 ft. high. 



" I measured the trunk of a Portugal laurel tree at Ormiston 

 Hall, and found its girth 5 ft. 1 in. at 3 ft. from the ground. 

 The branches of a Portugal laurel at Belmont Castle measure 

 100 ft. in circumference." 



Besides the above information received from Mr. Bishop, who 

 has paid more attention to such matters than any man I know, 

 I may mention that the finest specimens of Norway spruce 

 (y^^bies excelsa) in this country stand in a row, in the bottom of 

 a dell, at Dupplin Castle. There are also some fine specimens 

 of silver firs, above 3 ft. in diameter, and from 80 ft. to 90 ft. in 

 height, at Errol Park, Fingask, and the Ballo, Carse of Gowrie, 

 about eighty years old. A plant of ^'rbutus t/^nedo, at Annat 

 Gardens, twenty-four years old, measures 3 ft. 3 in. round the 

 stem, near the ground; the branches cover a circle, the diameter 

 of which is 20 ft., height 14 ft. The Platanus orientalis was 

 introduced into this country at least a hundred years since ; and, 

 before the year 1814, many fine specimens were to be met with 

 at different places : but, that year, all plants of that species, 

 above eight or nine years old, perished ; and none are to be seen 

 in this quarter above twenty-five or thirty years' standing. Some 

 plants of twenty-five years, at Annat Park, in the middle of a 

 plantation, are 27 ft. high ; with clean stems 9 ft. up, and about 

 6 in. in diameter, and covered with small branches two thirds of 

 their length. The oldest hemlock spruce (^^bies canadensis) I 

 know of, in this quarter, is at Invermay ; where, and at Rossie 

 Priory, are some very large and old arbor-vitse trees. 



Annat Gardeiis, Jan. 30. 1835. 



Art. VI. Remarks on the Rot in the Larch. By Mr. William 

 Taylor, Gardener at Thainston, near Kintore, Aberdeenshire. 



Over the whole extent of a forest here of 100 acres of Scotch 

 pine, from fifty-four to sixty years of age, there are a few larches 

 scattered, about the same age as the Scotch pine, but generally 

 much larger, some of them containing upwards of 20 cubic feet 

 sale measure. Until of late, these larches appeared to be in a 



