9° 



FLORA AND SYLVA. 



found in the mountains of Japan as a small 

 tree of 20 or more feet, and, though first im- 

 ported in 1862, it remained for many years 

 almost unnoticed. It is of slow growth but 

 young plants soon flower; old trees covered 

 thickly from top to bottom with their pecu- 

 liar starry clusters are very attractive. Increased 

 by grafting upon seedlings of the American 

 Witch-Hazel. 



The Japan Witch-Hazel (H. japonic a). 

 — -A shrub of dwarf growth and flowering later 

 than the Tree Witch-Hazel in February and 

 March. It never grows much higher than 

 5 or 6 feet, with stout grey shoots upon which 

 appear the three-flowered stemless clusters, 

 identical in shape with those of arborea, but 

 less striking in colour, the red calyx inclining 

 to brown and the petals to a paler yellow. Its 

 leaves are similar but a little larger. Also 

 from the mountain region of Japan. The 

 variety known as Japonica Zuccariniana is so 

 like its parent as to be almost indistinguish- 

 able save in its increasing lack of colour; it is 

 therefore of small value. 



The Hairy Witch-Hazel {H. mollis). — ■ 

 A tree from the south-west of China, but, like 

 all the Witch-Hazels, quite hardy in England 

 and of good growth. It differs from the other 

 kinds in its much larger leaves (5 inches long 

 by 3 inches wide) of different shape and covered 

 beneath with a dense felt-like coating of hairs. 

 Its flowers resemble those of the Japanese kinds 

 but the yellow petals are perhaps a trifle larger 

 and less waved, and are the brightest of all in 

 colour, though coming rather later than those 

 of arbor ea. 



The American Witch-Hazel (H. virgi- 

 nica). — An old shrub long grown in gardens 

 for its irregular yellow flowers of peculiar starry 

 shape, coming from October to December. 

 Opening in long succession their display is 

 never showy, but not without interest at such 

 a season ; in a fine autumn a great number of 

 flowers are seen in beauty at one time and it 

 gains in effect. Its leaves are large, rough, and 

 hazel-like upon a loose open bush of freegro wth 

 but inclined to be straggling and untidy in out- 

 line. Eastern United States ; introduced to 

 English gardens in 1736. It is a shrub of some 

 medicinal value and formerly held in high 

 esteem by the Indians for its virtues, and by 

 the superstitious for its reputed property of 



indicating deposits of hidden treasure. A red- 

 petalled sport or seedling has recently been 

 found growing upon the hills of New York 

 state, and may prove of value for our winter 

 gardens. 



Thinning for Timber. — We have lately heard so 

 much about the English way of over-thinning in 

 woodlands, that it may be well to show that it is 

 easy to go too far in the opposite direction, and that 

 it is a question of degree and of kind. The wood- 

 land question is so mixed up with that of kinds, 

 soils, climates, markets, and conditions, that it is 

 useless to lay down hard and fast rules with regard 

 to it. The worst blunder is in not maintaining the 

 forest canopy. The art is to thin to the right degree 

 for each kind, and use, and yet not lose this canopy ; 

 and this is a question of common-sense, and the size 

 and quality of timber wanted. We cannot look at 

 a lot of Oaks 200 years old and only 19^ inches 

 thick, and at another lot of the same age twice as 

 thick again, without asking as to the cause of the 

 difference. The former, with boles 65 feet long, 

 give about 66 cubic feet of timber each, and are 

 worth ^3 19s. apiece. The latter give 192 cubic 

 feet, and are worth ^23 1 6s. apiece. The one wood 

 may contain 200 of the smaller trees to every fifty 

 or sixty of the larger ones in the other ; but, apart 

 from the money gain, the difference in quality of 

 material on the ground is not all loss, for many sur- 

 plus stems will have been taken out as thinnings. 

 There is no need for argument, however ; the fact 

 is convincing. Slow-grown, soft-wooded Oaks 19-^ 

 inches in diameter make poor planks, or may be, 

 a little wood for cooperage, whereas the trees of 

 greater girth are good for all uses. Let us thin out 

 our crowded Oaks ; we shall in this way reap other 

 advantages also. Left to itself, the Beech forest, 

 handsome as it is, does not turn over the capital, and 

 the value of the timber does not increase in pro- 

 portion to its size, or anything like it, as it does in 

 the case of the Oak. But thinned at short intervals 

 it gives a constant supply of abundant produce, even 

 as much as half the current increment. These forests, 

 under timid foresters, are allowed to sleep ; whereas 

 in Denmark, in bolder hands, they realise 55 to 65 

 cubic feet in thinnings, or almost as much as at the 

 principal fellings. In broad-leaved high forests of 

 mixed kinds it is another story. The Ash if it can- 

 not get ahead of the rest languishes and dies. The 

 Oak also is sore beset among the dense leaves of 

 the Beeches, Maples, Elms, and Hornbeams even. 

 Its finest branches are killed off and promising trees 

 are ruined. In certain high forests one may see the 

 last of the Oaks being strangled by the Beeches, 

 struggling by devious ways, as thin as poles, 80 feet 

 long and a few inches thick, only to die eventually 

 I as slender starvelings. — Indian Forester. 



