186 CULTURE AND MANAGEMENT OF OAK. 



pered in the same quality of land where oaks have 

 perished, even though the treatment of the former 

 should have been in every respect similar to that 

 of the latter ; because the mode of culture which is 

 found to answer with one species of plants is of- 

 ten in the highest degree injurious to another. No 

 farmer would think of proceeding exactly in the 

 same manner in rearing cabbages and turnips. 

 Transplanting, which is the life of the one, is known 

 to succeed very indifferently v^^ith the other. 



If there be any truth in these remarks, it surely 

 is incumbent on those who pretend that either our 

 soil or climate is decidedly unfavourable to the 

 growth of oaks, and lay to the charge of one or 

 other, or both of these, the disappointments which 

 have so frequently attended endeavours to rear that 

 species of trees ; it is certainly incumbent on them 

 to show, before we can rationally acquiesce in their 

 judgment, that the mode of culture has been per- 

 fect, and that to it none of the alleged failures can 

 be imputed. Till they can do this, it is evident 

 that their opinion, instead of being built, as they 

 imagine, on the rock of experience, is erected on 

 the baseless foundation of mere gratuitous assump- 

 tion. 



Those, indeed, who consider our climate as the 



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