214 



is right in his ideas of layering down the spruce fir 

 as well as the royal oak. Before laying down my 

 pen I beg to observe, that before the plantations on 

 the estate of Braco were planted, say about sixty 

 years ago, there was not a tree to be seen in all that 

 part of the country, after passing Dunblane. It was 

 then the most bleak and barren part of all Scotland 5 

 as will appear from the following anecdote. A gen- 

 tleman who was born and brought up in America, 

 came on a visit to General Graham at Braco, when 

 the plantations were in their infancy, after passing 

 Dunblane, he exclaimed in ecstasy — " What a glo- 

 rious country this is ! there is not a tree to be seen 

 in the whole of it," — the American concluding that 

 no country was of use till it was cleared of wood. 

 I need not say (as every traveller must have seen it) 

 that the woods on the estate of Braco are a very 

 great ornament and beauty to this yet naked and cold 

 looking part of the country ; and they do infinite 

 honour to the memory of the late General Graham, 

 uncle to the present proprietor, who laid them off and 

 planted them. At the time, he was laughed at as 

 making a fruitless attempt to improve, by planting, 

 such a cold poor soil ; but his enterprising spirit, 

 coupled with his knowledge and abilities, overcame 

 every difficulty, and have succeeded in making a 

 little paradise where before there was nothing but 

 black heath. His name deserves to be revered while 

 a tree lives on the estate. I would say to the neigh- 

 bouring proprietors of this yet naked country, — Go 

 you and do likewise. There are many trees of spruce 

 fir on this same estate layering their branches, and of 

 themselves sending up fine young trees, some of these 

 natural children are 20 feet high, 

 January I7, 1829. 



