11.] 



ENCLOSING, LAYING OUT. 



23 



to that of a disappointed longing. I really (recollecting former 

 times) feel some remorse in thus plotting against the poor fellows ; 

 but the worst of it is, they will not be content with fair play : they 

 will have the earliest in the season, and the hest, as long as the 

 season lasts : and, therefore, I must, however reluctantly, shut 

 them out altogether. 



So. By the time that the wall- trees begin to produce any thing 

 of a crop, the hedge will become an effectual fence : the latter 

 will go on providing protection as the trees go on in making 

 prodsion for fruit. The ditch and the bank should be attended 

 to during this time. If the earth moulder down, it should be put 

 up again : any holes or washings that appear in the bank should 

 be regularly stopped, and the earth carefully replaced every au- 

 tumn : the prunings and clippings should be regularly and carefully 

 performed, once every winter, and once every summer, about the 

 middle of the month of July. This summer clipping must be 

 earlier or later, according to the season, or to the climate : but it 

 should take place just before the starting of the 2tlidsummer shoot. 

 All trees shoot twice in the year : the shoot that comes out in 

 the spring ends about [Midsummer, and then begins another shoot 

 that comes out of the end of it ; which is about one-third and 

 sometimes about one-half, smaller than the spring shoot, and the 

 pruning or clipping should take place just before this new shoot 

 comes out : this operation causes many new and small shoots to 

 come forth, and gives the hedge a very beautiful appearance ; and 

 also makes it much thicker than it otherwise would be. The 

 seed of the black thorn is a little sloe, and not easily to be ob- 

 tained in any quantity : its leaf is not so beautiful as that of the 

 hawthorn ; but its wood stronger, and its thorns a great deal more 

 formidable. A holly hedge only requires more patience ; and we 

 should recollect that it is evergreen : and as effectual, in a fence, 

 as either of our thorns ; for its leaves are so full of sharp prickles 

 that no boy M ill face a holly hedge of any degree of thickness. To 

 have such a hedge, you must gather the berries in autumn, keep 

 them in damp sand for a year ; then sow them in November, and, 

 when they come up in the spring, keep the bed carefully weeded, 

 not only then, but all through the summer ; let them stand in this 

 bed another summer ; then transplant them in rows in a nurseiy 

 of rich ground ; there let them stand for two or three years ; then 

 plant them for the hedge at the same distances, and in the same 



