404 CONIFERiE. 



Upon the Dee, the forests of Braemar and Invereauld 

 are of very large extent, and produce Pines of as great 

 a size as any that are to be met with in Scotland. During 

 our excursions to that interesting portion of the highlands 

 we have frequently admired the beautiful forms and huge 

 proportions of some of those near to Mar Lodge and 

 the falls of the Dee, particularly where the trees had 

 stood sufficiently apart to allow the retention of a portion 

 of their side branches, and the full and unrestrained ex- 

 pansion of their heads, objects indeed well worthy of the 

 pencil of the artist or the commendation of a Gilpin or 

 a Lauder. But, alas ! since we last visited that interesting 

 district, we have learnt with regret that the axe has 

 been let loose within the precincts of the forest of Mar, 

 and that already much of its finest timber has fallen 

 beneath its fatal stroke. 



Such are the principal remnants of those ancient Cale- 

 donian forests, which, to judge from the constant occur- 

 rence of Pine trees, found buried beneath the peat mosses 

 wherever they have been dug into, as well as from other 

 remains, and old decayed roots upon many extensive 

 wastes, would seem, at some earlier period, to have spread 

 over a much larger portion of its surface than they now 

 occupy. To their present limits they have been reduced, 

 not more effectually, we believe, by the axe, than by the 

 great increase of herds and flocks, which, once admitted 

 in any considerable numbers within the precincts of forest 

 land, soon put an effectual stop to the renovation of its 

 timber, by constantly browsing upon and destroying the 

 seedling plants as they spring from the ground. 



In all these native forests we find the soil is generally 

 of a dry sandy or gravelly nature, composed of the debris 

 of the older or granitic rocks ; this, indeed, appears to 

 be the soil most congenial to the nature of the common 



