198 OUR FORESTS AND WOODLANDS 
matter we have not much to learn beyond what 
our ancestors knew. ‘In moist and doggy places,’ 
said shrewd John Evelyn, ‘they will flourish 
wonderfully, so the ground be not spewing ; but 
especially near the Margins and banks of Rivers.’ 
And in adding precepts on their cultivation he 
advised how ‘srunchions of seven, or eight feet long, 
thrust two foot into the earth, when once roofed, 
may be cut at six inches above ground; and thus 
placed at a yard distant they will immediately fur- 
nish a kind of Copse. But in case you plant them 
of rooted-trees, or smaller sets, fix them not too 
deep; for though we bury the Trunchions thus 
profound, yet is the root which they strike com- 
monly but shallow.’ 
It is strange how the necessity for close plant- 
ing, above clearly advocated, even for light- 
demanding trees, such as the ‘poplar and abele 
(which are all of them Aospitable trees, for 
anything thrives under their shades), should have 
been so completely lost sight of in British 
Forestry since the time of the Restoration. Prob- 
ably very few of the plantations of any sort 
made during the last century have shown so many 
as the 4840 plants per acre recommended even 
