Grigor's Eastern Arboretum. 353 



within the compass of a few miles, so that the whole scale of the vegetable 

 creation may be traversed in the course of a day. In Vera Cruz, a province 

 of Mexico, situated under a tropical sun, this fact is most strikingly and 

 beautifully illustrated. At the base of the mountains, and near to the sea-side, 

 the most suffocating heat prevails, and vegetation proceeds as if in a hot-bed. 

 In ascending the mountains, tiers of vegetables rise above one another in 

 admirable order. Nature becoming gradually less luxuriant and the flowers 

 less coloured, till, passing through the zones of liquidambar, banana, Mexican 

 oaks, &c., pine trees only are to be found, and these amid everlasting snows. 

 In our own country, we find the pine tree preferring the loftiest mountains of^ 

 our land, to which it is indigenous ; and one of them, indeed, P. marilima, 

 unlike the most of ligneous plants, courts the sea-shore and withstands its 

 blasts. The beech, again, rises in chalky and stony grounds, and flourishes 

 where other trees will not grow; we have seen it in great beauty and per- 

 fection even on the debris of rocks of a siliceous character. Such is the 

 adaptation of Nature. 



" At the same time, it is experienced by almost every one, that, if any degree 

 of care be taken in planting them, the most of trees, though huddled together, 

 as they often are, without reference to the soils and situations best suited to 

 the various species, will, for a few years, maintain a tolerably healthy appear- 

 ance, more especially if planted in a sheltered situation ; but afterwards they 

 soon begin to fall away : the larch becomes black and unsightly, putting forth 

 a profusion of fruit or cones, — a never-failing sign of its unhealthy state ; 

 the spruce fir loses its under branches ; the ash and elm cover themselves 

 with moss ; and, in fact, every species, except that to which the soil and situ- 

 ation are adapted, betrays some sign of its being, misplaced. In this work, 

 therefore, it shall be our object to point out, so far as our experience and 

 observation suggest, the proper soils and exposures for trees generally grown 

 in England, as we are convinced that a knowledge leading to their proper 

 distribution will induce many proprietors to plant tracts of country which 

 have been hitherto considered unfit for forests, and be the means of heighten- 

 ing the beauty of plantations and pleasure-grounds already in existence. 



" We have no desii'e to speak disparagingly of the numerous works already 

 published on the subject of trees. The most of them, so far as we know, con- 

 tain many useful hints on the work of planting, pruning, &c. ; but is it not 

 notorious that, with one or two exceptions, those authors treat the subject in 

 a dull, uninteresting manner, as if a tree were the most uninviting thing in 

 existence, and as if its beautiful fabric, root and branch, were to be valued 

 only in proportion to the extent of flooring, or the number of chairs and 

 tables it would produce ? We confess that such information is highly neces- 

 sary to be known, and any arboricultural treatise would be imperfect without 

 it ; but to make those dry statistics the sole theme in a work of this descrip- 

 tion is disgusting, and accounts perhaps for books of this sort being so much 

 banished from our polite reading. They seem to have forgot that there is 

 poetry in trees, — that they bear much of the history of our country, and that 

 they are loved and venerated by some men as reminiscences of the past." 



After referring to the Arboretum Britannicum in terms gratifying to our 

 feelings, the author says : — 



" As to our own humble pretensions on the subject, we must allow the pre- 

 sent work to speak for us. Out of love to the, science, we have devoted an 

 apprenticeship of about twenty years to practical botanical pursuits, so that 

 we are without excuse if we should not throughout be guided by generally 

 ascertained facts. 



" It is our intention, then, to notice all the trees of Norfolk that are 

 interesting on account of their age, size, rarity, historical association, or in 

 any other respect ; and, in order to make it complete as a book of reference, 

 we shall annex directions as to sowing, transplanting, pruning, and felling all 

 our English timber trees ; the whole forming a popular dictionary of every 

 thing relating to this interesting department of Natural History. 



