54 LEGUMINACE.E. 



being large, succulent, and well- calculated to abstract nou- 

 rishment from the surface, near which they run. It is this 

 power of abstraction and rapid early growth that has de- 

 ceived many, and given reason to suppose that the Locust 

 would continue to thrive upon a poor soil ; for, seeing the 

 progress it makes for two or three years in soil of an 

 inferior quality, and as long as the surface remains unex- 

 hausted, planters look for a continuation of this rampant 

 growth, an expectation, indeed, we ourselves entertained 

 some years ago, before we understood the nature and habit 

 of the tree. 



After the first ten or twelve years, when the Locust 

 upon good land will probably have attained a height of 

 twenty feet, and a diameter of three or four inches, its 

 growth becomes very slow ; and few trees at the end of 

 fifty or sixty years will be found with a trunk of more 

 than a foot in diameter. 



In cold wet clays, or poor tilly soils, it very soon be- 

 comes stunted and unhealthy, rots at the heart, and never 

 attains size sufficient for any useful purpose. It is gene- 

 rally raised from seed, and the best is procured from 

 America, though that ripened in England or France vege- 

 tates freely and is frequently used. 



With us, the seed ripens in October, and is perhaps best 

 sown immediately after being gathered ; but it will keep 

 in the pod till spring, or even for several years if buried 

 deep in dry earth. It comes up the summer following 

 the autumn or spring in which it is sown, and the plants 

 by the end of autumn are generally fit for transplanting 

 into nursery rows, or to the situations where they are to 

 remain ; for many of them, if the soil be rich, will in that 

 short time have attained a height of three or four feet. 



