56 



SYLVA BRITANNICA. 



be wise ; that is, till they grow old, and find by 

 experience the prudence and necessity of it." Ci- 

 cero mentions planting as one of the most delightful 

 occupations of old age, and it is indeed of all pur- 

 suits connected with the interests of mankind, one 

 of the most nobly disinterested, yet the most truly 

 wise. He who puts a sapling into the ground, is 

 morally certain that he shall not live to enjoy the 

 shade of its matured branches ; but he enjoys it 

 every day, and a thousand fold, in the thought, that 

 the land, which to his predecessors had been only a 

 barren waste, will present to his successors a scene 

 of waving beauty, sheltering the surrounding country, 

 and inviting many a devious step to explore its 

 tangled haunts. This fine feeling of entering by 

 proxy, as it were, into the interests and enjoyments 

 of posterity, is most pleasingly expressed in the 

 following lines, on an obelisk at the termination of a 

 noble avenue in the park of Lord Carlisle, at Castle 

 Howard in Yorkshire, and written by one of his 

 ancestors : 



" If to perfection these plantations rise. 

 If they agreeably my heirs surprise, 

 This faithful pillar will their age declare, 

 As long as Time these characters shall spare. 

 Here then with kind remembrance read his name 

 Who for posterity performed the same. 



Charles, the 3d Earl of Carlisle, 

 of the family of the Howards. 

 Erected 1731." 



