26 APPEABANOE OF THE LANDES. 



I have not seen these plantations, but I have in France had much 

 conversation in regard to them with others of similar tastes who have 

 resided in the midst of them. The accounts given to me were vague, 

 but not more so than conversational statements in general are. They 

 left on my mind the impression that on the sea margin there is a pretty 

 broad beach, and some 100 yards or more from this — 200 it may be, 

 or 300 — the trees have been planted in a belt following, to some ex- 

 tent, the line of the coast, and extending in breadth irregularly from 

 half a mile to a mile, it may be, or more, beyond which the planta- 

 tions are continued in strips of some breadth, crossing each other at 

 right angles, and thus enclosing quadrangular patches or fields, which 

 have been brought under cultivation. Upwards of 100,000 acres of 

 land were reported to me as having been reclaimed, and to a con- 

 siderable extent covered with trees. 



