38 



FLORA AND SYLVA, 



In dealing with poor land the question of profit cannot be excluded, and 

 to what better use could one put bad land, poor rocky slopes, starved sandy 

 flats, boggy hills (as in Ireland), and wet districts, and land 



Plant Land P °° r to ° co ^ an< ^ p oor to De ploughed with any profit, as in some 

 southern wealds ? There is no way we can use such land so 

 well as by planting it with the true evergreen forest trees. There is no Saturday 

 night in the woodland ; it puts on its profit without other care, adorning 

 and sheltering the land and helping the various living creatures that haunt the 

 woods, adding in many ways to the charms of the country. Few know the 

 power of these trees to grow on the poorest land. We cannot grow Oaks on 

 nothing, but I have seen young Pines sow themselves on land from which the 

 top soil had been entirely removed by gold hunters. Many poor, cold, ill- 

 starred hill-sides of the north of England, Wales, and Ireland could grow the 

 Mountain Pines as well as they grow in their native lands. The Corsican Pine 

 makes a growth of from 20 inches to 3 feet a year in a quarry I know from 

 which every bit of soil has been removed. 



Another reason for choosing evergreen trees for planting poor land is that 

 woods can be so quickly raised. If we make a right choice of young plants, 

 and wire against rabbits and hares before planting, we may 

 Quickness of ra j se sheltering woods in ten years. Little plants, after a few 

 years' struggle with the turf, settle with it, and are soon tall 

 enough to give us the shelter and effects which only evergreen woods can 

 give. 



Our climate helps us if we only know how to take advantage of it, because 

 of its affinity to the sub-alpine conditions in which the great Pines of the 

 world so often grow — the land below the snow line. All the Pines of Europe 

 are easily grown as forest trees in our country, because the conditions are 

 something like those of their natural climate. If we go to North Africa we 

 find the Cedars growing far above the wide sea of arid hills where the snow 

 lies late, among our wild flowers and our Thorn and Yew growing with them. 

 A man after middle age could easily raise noble woods of these trees in his life- 

 time, while a young man, owner of a poor, treeless estate, might clothe the 

 hills with a stately forest. 



In the country house, all the cooking and heating might be much better 

 done with wood fuel ; the British kitchen range is a costly fraud, and if all 

 our coal mines failed, every country parish might grow its 

 own fuel and light. Yet it is a common thing to see people 

 bringing coals from Newcastle and carting it miles from a railway station, 

 whilst abundance of fuel lies rotting in their woodlands. The very wealth of 

 Britain in coal has been our loss, in leading us to forget the old ways of cook- 

 ing and warming. The architect and the housemaid, and the modern grate 



