^68 CULTURE AND MANAGEMENT OF OAK. 



the merit of being the first to make this public 

 A more perfect way of applying it than the above, 

 would perhaps be, to lay the roots of the tree bare, 

 and place it in contact with them, after having first 

 mixed it with twenty times its bulk of fresh mould. 



* I allow this to stand as it was first written, though, since 

 reading Sir Henry Steuart's work on giving immediate effect 

 to Wood, I am convinced that the preparation which he applies 

 to such trees as do not appear to thrive after removal, would 

 have a much more powerful effect than the simple application 

 recommended at the place to which this note refers. This 

 preparation consists of a mixture of earth and coal-ashes ; 

 and his manner of applying it, the reader will find describ- 

 ed towards the end of the account of his method given in 

 this volume. 1 cannot avoid thinking that those who have 

 plantations in parks or pleasure-grounds in an unthriving state, 

 from badness of soil or such-like cause, would find the most 

 gratifying effects to succeed a skilful application of more than 

 one of Sir Henry's composts. Some of these are very cheap, 

 and the most expensive of them, which is the one here referred 

 to, given at the rate of three or four cart loads to each tree, 

 could be applied to several thousand trees for a comparatively 

 trifling sum. 



Query, Might not those who have already plantations about 

 their mansions, but of a diminutive size, from badness of soil or 

 otherwise, rapidly produce all the improvement they could de- 

 sire, by a judicious use of Sir Henry's composts, without adopt- 

 ing any more of his plan ? 



