MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 



XXV 



tleman to try this course with phiuts which he intends to 

 cast away. 



None of these operations bear much on jour subject ; 

 but it is only the local circumstances of this place which 

 have prevented me from trying yoiu' system in a regular 

 manner. The ground is bank and brae, all covered 

 with plantations, and admitting few situations where single 

 trees would be an object. I have no subjects fit for trans- 

 plantation, unless I make a nursery ; and my predecessors 

 having done nothing for me, I have not, like you at Al- 

 lanton, any clumps or stripes which can be converted to 

 that pm-pose. At an extremity of the property, indeed, 

 there is the remains of a natural oak wood, but besides 

 that I believe the trees are stock-roots, and therefore not 

 to be easily raised, they are too heavy to be dealt with, 

 without more expense than I care at present to employ. 



"So that, on the whole, I may say video Queliora, &c. 

 I am fully convinced of the superiority of your plan 

 to any which I have hitherto had occasion to observe. 

 But my plan has been laid to avoid the necessity of 

 transplantation entirely. To make myself understood, 

 I must mention that the house is, contrary to the usual 

 custom, contiguous to the garden. It fronts a court-yard 

 filled with shrubs, and as many trees of about fifteen feet 

 high as afibrd a good chance for those which may be 

 permitted to stand as single trees. On the other side of 

 the court-yard wall runs a pretty steep bank which is 

 covered with thriving plantations about fifteen years old. 

 The same bank rmis westward about half a mile, and is 

 completely planted all along its extent. On the north 

 side of the house there is another steep bank, with planta- 

 tions running down to the Tweed, which is also completely 

 flourishing, and in a situation to be opened into green, or 

 shut up as thicket, as taste may determine. Below lies a 



