PART VIII. 



PICTURESQUE 



PLANTING. 



577 



SECT. VI. OF FELLING WOOD. 



In trees, as in the human species, there are three stages; youth, 

 manhood, and old age. In the period of youth, the growth is 

 rapid; in manhood, that growth is matured; and in old age it 

 begins to decay. 



The most profitable season for felling timber, is at what may 

 thus be termed the beginning of manhood. After that time, 

 though the tree may appear sound and healthy, its annual in- 

 crease is so little, that it would be more profitable to cut it 

 down and replant. The number of years that a tree may stand, 

 before it arrives at this period, must vary in different soils and 

 situations; but the period itself may easily be ascertained — by 

 the annual shoots — the state of the bark — and by taking the 

 circumference of the tree at the same place for two or three 

 successive seasons, and comparing the difference. In the view 

 of profiting from timber produce, it is of great consequence to 

 cut down plantations at maturity*. Many trees will stand 



* " It should be in the vigour and perfection of trees (which, for the oak, I take 

 to be about the age of fifty, or betwixt that and sixty years of growth, where the 

 soil is natural) that a felling should be celebrated." — Hunter's Evelyrts Sylva> 

 p. 508. 



4 E 



