CHAP. CI. ULMA^CEJE. f. r/ LMUS. 1383 



clays, and all moist soils. I saw a line of them at Beanlieu Abbey, in Hampshire, 

 50 ft. or CO ft. high, not more than 4ft. or 5ft. in circumference; all hollow, 

 from the root to the top, as if they had been bored for water pipes. They grew 

 on a sandy, marly, wet, heathy soil." (Dendrologia, p. 3G.) " The propriety 

 of planting the elm," Marshall observes, " depends entirely upon the soil : it 

 is the height of folly to plant it upon light sandy soil. There is not, generally 

 speaking, a good elm in the whole county of Norfolk : by the time they arrive 

 at the size of a man's waist, they begin to decay at the heart; and, if not taken 

 at the critical time, they presently become useless as timber. This is the case 

 in all light soils : it is in stiff strong land which the elm delights. It is observ- 

 able, however, that here it grows comparatively slow. In light land, especially 

 if it be rich, its growth is very rapid ; but its wood is light, porous, and of little 

 value, compared with that grown upon strong land, which is of a closer stronger 

 texture, and at the heart will have the colour, and almost the hardness and 

 heaviness, of iron. On such soils the elm becomes profitable, and is one of 

 the four cardinal trees, which ought, above all others, to engage the planter's 

 attention ; it will bear a very wet situation." {Planting and Rural Ornament, ii. 

 p. 431.) 



Propagation and Culture. The common elm produces abundance of suckers 

 from the roots, both near and at a great distance from the stem ; and through- 

 out Europe these afford the most ready mode of propagation, and that which 

 appears to have been most generally adopted till the establishment of regu- 

 lar commercial nurseries; the suckers being procured from the roots of grown 

 up trees, in hedgerows, parks, or plantations. In Britain, the present mode 

 of propagation is by layers from stools, or by grafting on the U. montana. 

 The layers are made in autumn, or in the course of the winter, and are rooted, 

 or fit to be taken off, in a year. Grafting is generally performed in the whip 

 or splice manner, close to the root, in the spring ; and the plants make shoots 

 of 3 ft. or 4 ft. in length the same year. Budding is sometimes performed, but 

 less frequently. On the Continent, plants are very often procured from 

 stools, simply by heaping up earth about the shoots which proceed from them. 

 These shoots root into the earth; and, after growing three or four years, during 

 which time they attain the height of 10 ft. or 15 ft., they are slipped off; and 

 either planted where they are finally to remain, or in nursery lines. When 

 they are transplanted to their final situation, the side shoots are cut off; and 

 the main stem is headed down to the height of 8 ft. or 10 ft.; so that newly 

 planted trees appear nothing more than naked truncheons. The first year, a 

 great many shoots are produced from the upper extremity of each truncheon; 

 and in the autumn of that year, or in the second spring, these shoots are all 

 cut off but one, which soon forms an erect stem, and as regular a headed tree 

 as if no decapitation had previously taken place. (See Gard. Mag., vol. ii. 

 p. 226. and p. 461. ; and Annales de la Soc. d'Hort. de Paris, t. xviii. p. 360.) 

 This corresponds with Evelyn's recommendation to plant trees about the 

 " scantling of your leg, and to trim off their heads at 5 ft. or 6 ft. in height. " 

 Cato recommends 5 or 6 fingers in thickness; adding that you can hardly plant 

 an elm too big, provided you trim the roots, and cut off the head. All the 

 avenues and rows of elm trees in Europe were planted in this manner pre- 

 viously to about the middle of the eighteenth century ; and, according to 

 Poiteau (Ann., 1. c), the same practice is still the most general in France. 

 The late Professor Thouin, in his Cours de Culture (torn. ii. p. 231.), argued 

 against it, and had some avenues planted in the Jardin des Plantes, without 

 cutting off the heads of the trees; but, besides being found much more expen- 

 sive, from the necessity of taking up the plants with a greater quantity of roots, 

 transporting them to where they were to be planted with greater care, and 

 preparing a wider pit to receive them, it was found that they grew much slower 

 for the first 3 or 4 years than those that had been decapitated. The only 

 advantage proposed to be gained by planting trees with their heads nearly 

 entire is, that of preserving the centre of their stems from being rotted, in 

 consequence of the water entering at the end made by the decapitation ; but 



