526 



ON USEFUL AND 



BOOK I. 



thick with other plantations. As they grow, they are gradually 

 thinned out, until the trees left standing are able to defend 

 themselves from cattle. The fence is then removed or de- 

 stroyed, the outline varied, and the spaces between the trees 

 sown with grass seeds. Fir groves are often allowed to remain 

 without thinning, until they are fifteen or twenty years old ; 

 and then they are considered as a full crop, and cut regu- 

 larly over. 



2. A wood is well adapted both for ornament and utility. It 

 is formed, at first, by planting timber-trees at such distances as 

 would form a grove, and filling up the interstices with the kinds 

 intended for undergrowth. This is the most generally appli- 

 cable kind of plantation, and common iy the most profitable, 

 particularly in strips and belts. There, the undergrowth thrives 

 best; thickens the strip below; completes the shelter; and, 

 by concealing the real breadth, gives a massiveness and gran- 

 deur to narrow plantations, which they can never have, if 

 planted in the grove style. Oak undergrowth is 'generally the 

 most proper ; and, if its worth were fully known, many planta- 

 tions might be made of double their present value, have a much 

 better effect, and afford better shelter. Most plantations (par- 

 ticularly in Scotland), though they generally go under the name 

 of woods, are in reality of the grove kind. We find none of the 

 trees kept decidedly under the rest, cut over, and allowed to 



