26 Causes. 



heart wood will have become completely 

 decayed, leaving nothing but a tube, and 

 the branches will fall to pieces in the hand 

 when touched. 



Many causes lead to this, but the chief are 

 inadaptability of the tree to the soil and 

 the aspect, to a wet and cold bottom, dry 

 surface soil, over-crowding when young, 

 thereby reducing the foliage radius and 

 ramification of root fibre (which, observers 

 will know, correspond with each other), to 

 the sweeping away of the fallen leaf, and the 

 close cutting of grass. Another cause, not 

 belonging to this series at all, is that of 

 noxious fumes. Look in the neighbourhood 

 of brickfields, or where the trees are exposed 

 to the smoke of large cities, or to the 

 neighbourhood of large manufacturing towns, 

 here it is seen in all its ugliness. 



Take limes growing upon exposed sites, on 

 a wet, cold clay bottom, and possibly a dry 

 sandy surface, and we find the tree altogether 

 out of its natural habitat, which is a sheltered 

 position, a loamy soil, and porous subsoil. 

 Where this is accompanied by limited foliage 



