32 BEGIME. 



The action of forests on the soil below is referable to two princi- 

 pal causes, cover and improved composition. Cover, the result itself 

 on the one hand of the foliage overhead and on the other of the 

 dead and fallen leaves, maintains the soil moist and loose. Im- 

 proved composition, due to the organic detritus mixed with the 

 original soil, modifies the condition of the latter in the most favoura- 

 ble manner for vegetation, while enriching it with the most useful 

 elements of plant food. In high forests, the cover is always com- 

 plete, and the improvement of the soil is at its maximum. In 

 copses, on the contrary, the cover disappears periodically at short 

 intervals and is a long time before it is completely reformed. Some- 

 times for the entire half of the Rotation. The result is that improve- 

 ment of the soil, slight in any case, ceases partially and even wholly 

 after each coppice exploitation. 



Again, the aerial organs of nutrition of plants — branches, buda 

 and leaves — are, for a considerable number of years, only slightly 

 developed in a young copse, which cannot therefore iform all the 

 wood that the soil is capable of producing. It is then easy to 

 understand why the sum of production is less in copses than 

 in high forests, at least when the latter are managed according to the 

 rules of sylviculture. This is a well established fact, and if there are 

 exceptions to it, they are more apparent than real. Objectors may, 

 for instance, question whether in a rich and moist soil High Forest 

 would yield more than Coppice, which Regime has been known in 

 such soils to produce up to 120 and 140 cubic feet per acre per 

 annum. We may, however, reply that that quantity consists chiefly of 

 the soft woods, whereas in High Forest the hard woods would form by 

 far the largest proportion of the yield. In all such comparisons made 

 to demonstrate the superiority of the Coppice Regime over, that of 

 High Forest, or at least its equality, similar stumbling blocks occur ,i 



(1) Iq the Forest block of Saiut Gobain-Couoy, the Coucy-le-Chateau portion is 

 in the condition of High Forest ; that of Saint Gobaiu in the state of Coppice. 

 In the former tract the crops, consisting of beech chiefly and oak, contain at the 

 age of 120 years, before being thinned, a standing stock of from 8200 to 9o00 

 cubic feet per acre. Adding to this the wood previously cut out, which 

 amounts to 2050 cubic feet at the least, we see that the average annual produc- 

 tion per acre is nearly 95 cubic feet. In the Saint Qobain tract, the soil being 

 as good if not better, the copse, containing scarcely any reserves at all and 

 consisting of horubeam, ash, birches and the softwoods in abundance, yields on 

 an average per acre, at the age of 35 years, 3060 stacked cubic feet and 400 

 fagots representing 270 stacked cubic feet more.. The mean annual production 

 is therefore only about 95 stacked cubic feet per acre, and this too composed 

 to a large extent of inferior wpecies. 



