SCOTS FIR. 



39 



earlier period than half a century ago, or there must 

 still be plantations of the true variety, in every dis- 

 trict of Scotland. Now, there is considerable diffi- 

 culty in believing the former part of the dilemma, 

 because at a period when there wap no great taste for 

 planting, it is rather improbable that any Scotsman 

 would have been at the pains of fetching across the 

 Atlantic the seed of a tree so like one that grew 

 every where in his own country, that he felt himself 

 under the necessity of calling it by the same name, 

 not to mention, that, if we make the date of intro- 

 duction much earlier than fifty years ago, an impro- 

 bability likewise arises from the little intercourse 

 we had with Canada, before it belonged to Great 

 Britain. If, on the other hand, the second part of 

 the proposition is acquiesced in, it is as good as al- 

 lowing that we have but one sort of the tree, from 

 whatever part of the world seed of it may have 

 been brought ; — for that our plantations formed by 

 art are all of the same kind, who ever doubted, or 

 can doubt ? 



It is farther asserted that the Highland fir, which 

 is the true species, presents a quite different aspect 

 from this foreign variety ; that it is a far nobler 

 tree, growing with a large spreading top, and put- 

 ting forth gigantic branches, and that the quality 



