OF FOREST-TREES. 



307 



it cannot be so conveniently done at once, and the pains would certainly CHAP. VII. 



be as fully recompensed in the growth of their timber as in that of their ^"^""v^ 

 grass : where poor hungry woods grow, rich corn and good cattle would 

 be more plentifully bred ; and it were beneficial to convert some wood- 

 land (where the proper virtue is exhausted) to pasture and tillage, pro- 

 vided that fresh land were improved also to wood in recompense, and to 

 balance the other. 



Where we find such uliginous and starved places, (which sometimes 

 obey no art or industry to drain, and of which our pale and fading corn 

 is a sure indication,) we are, as it were, courted to obey Nature, and im- 

 prove them by the propagation of Sallows, Willows, Alders, Abele, 

 Black-Cherry, Sycamore, Aspen, Birch, and the like hasty and profit- 

 able growers, by ranging them, casting of ditches, trenches, &c. as before 

 has been taught. 



In the mean time, it is a thing to be deplored that some persons bestow 

 so much in grubbing and dressing a few acres, which have been excellent 

 wood, to convert them into wretched pastures, not worth a quarter of 

 what the trees would have yielded, well ordered, and left standing ; since 

 it is certain, that barren land planted with wood will treble the expense 

 in a short time. Of this, the right honourable the lord viscount 

 Scudamore may, give fair proof, who having felled (as I am credibly in- 

 formed) a decayed wood, intended to set it to tenants ; but upon second 

 thoughts, (and for that this lordship saw it apt to cast wood,) inclosed and 

 preserved it. Before thirty years were expued it yielded him near 1 000/. 

 upon wood-falls, whereas the utmost rent of the whole piece of land 

 yearly was not above 8/. 10*. The like I am able to confii-m by in- 

 stancing a noble person, who, a little before our unhappy wars, having 

 sown three or four acres with acorns, the fourth year transplanted those 

 which grew too thick, all about his lordship. These trees are now * of • i664. 

 that stature, and so likely to prove excellent timber, that they are already 

 judged to be almost as much worth as the whole demesne ; and yet they 

 take oif nothing from other profits, having been discreetly disposed of at 

 the first designment. And supposing the longevity of trees should not ex- 

 tend to the periods we have, upon so good account, produced; yet neither 

 is their arrival to a very competent perfection so very discouraging : since 

 I am credibly informed, that several persons have built of timber, and 

 that of Oak, which were acorns within these forty years ; and I find it ere- 



