OF FRUIT AND FOREST TREES. 



197 



which are, the ruinous effects of hurricanes and high winds, 

 when the trees are generally left, in their wounded and dis- 

 figured state, to the accelerated operations of inevitable de- 

 cay. It also not unfrequently happens, that the heirs of large 

 estates, on coming to the possession of them, order great 

 numbers of trees to be promiscuously felled, before they have 

 attained a state of maturity, without paying the least attention 

 to provide a succession of young trees to supply their place ; 

 by such inexcusable negligence defeating the ends proposed by 

 the provident care and wisdom of their ancestors, depriving 

 the public of a valuable source of timber, either for domestic 

 purposes or national use, and reducing their country to a de- 

 pendance on foreign produce for supplying the demands of her 

 fleets and manufactures, 



I shall esteem myself most happy, if, in giving this tri- 

 bute of information to the general stock of public improve- 

 ment, I should promote an influejice that may excite noblemen 

 and gentlemen, and proprietors of land of every denomination 

 throughout the kingdom, to be actively solicitous in planting 

 and preserving oak-timber, the native growth of their coun- 

 try ; that Great Britain may never be under the dangerous as 

 well as disagreeable necessity of trusting the safety of her 

 seamen to the inferior texture and less durable quality of fo- 

 reign growths ; while the hardy oaks of England, which for 

 ages past^have been considered as affording the best timber 

 in the world for this building, and may have been said to 

 have brought home victory and commerce from every part 

 of the globe, are no longer suffered to diminish, as they ha\iie 

 done of late, to the manifest detriment and dishonour of our 

 country. 



Such an evil (and it is of no common magnitude) proceeds 

 from the negligence and inattention of the landed men, who, 

 from a spirit of patriotic ambition, as well as private interest, 

 should pay a very vigilant attention to the maintaining of a 

 succession of healthy, well-growing timber, for the service of 

 their country, nor any longer suffer the internal resources of 

 the kingdom to fail in furnishing materials for that great na- 

 tional object, the support of the British navy; as well as for 

 the many various demands of domestic utility. By making 

 such a provision for the public wants, they will add to their 

 own immediate wealth, as well as to the fortunes of those who 

 come after them : And, while I express my wishes that such 

 general good designs may be put in universal practice, I may 

 es;pre55 my belief, that the discovery which I have made, and 



P d 



