458 



VERT LARGE TREES" 



they do not put entire confidence in Sir Henry Steuarf^a restdts, and 

 they feel alarmed at what that writer says of the issue of a great 

 experiment tried at Edinburgh some^ years since, when the site of 

 the Botanic Garden was changed. In the first place, as to the expense 

 of the experiment, this writer says it would be needless, as well as 

 invidious, to investigate that, as it could be no object in a royal 

 institution ; and, secondly, he speaks rather coldly of the result, when 

 he merely says that " the removals were executed with a safety which 

 could scarcely have been anticipated." The meaning which this was 

 intended to convey is now explained in the notes to the third edition of 

 the Planter's Ouide, page 386, where we are distinctly informed that 

 although some things had succeeded well, yet that "the ordinary 

 forest-trees on the other hand, such as the Lime, the Birch, and the 

 "Walnut, appeared by no means so successful, although powerfully sup- 

 ported with cordage." Faint praise like this was not calculated to hold 

 out great expectations of success in transplanting large trees, con- 

 sidering that Macnab was the operator ; and it must have greatly 

 contributed to damp the ardour of those who would have been other- 

 wise encouraged by the success said by Sir Henry to have attended his 

 own proceedings. 



The practicability of removing large trees by ordinary means has, 

 however, been finally set at rest, in a manner open to no question, by a 

 large experiment in transplanting trees from ten to forty-nine feet in 

 height, at Amport House, near Andover, the seat of the Marq^uess of 

 ■Winchester. Mr, Joseph Holmes, the gardener there, has published an 

 account of the operation in a paper in the Journal of the Horticultural 

 Society (vol. vi. p. 14). In this communication he describes with minute- 

 ness the method he pursued, the difficulties that occurred, and the final 

 result of transplanting about a couple of hundred trees of large size 

 from a sheltered valley to much higher ground. The trees consisted of 



In all 204 such- trees were planted, of which 199 remain. The only 

 one which failed is thus spoken of by Mr. Holmes. " In transplanting 

 upwards of 200 trees, not one of the number failed, and it was found 

 necessary to sacrifice only one tree. The instance I allude to was that 

 of a fine Beech, fprty-two feet high, removed on»Sir H. Steuart's 



