APPENDIX. 



505 



This approach was originally laid out by Mr White, and does credit 

 to his professional talents. At one place, it seems, it appeared extremely 

 desirable to that artist to mask or conceal the approach from the house 

 and adjoining grounds, and it was equally proper, at the same place, to 

 conceal the house from them. This desirable object could be effected 

 only by means of wood ; and as the ground, for the most part, hung or 

 inclined pretty considerably towards the principal objects to be shut 

 out from the approach, half a lifetime might elapse ere the desired 

 effect could be produced from that quarter, by the ordinary mode of 

 planting, as only four Larches, and three Beeches of considerable size, 

 then stood upon these two acres of ground. But Sir Henry resolved to 

 attain the desired end at once, by means of the transplanting machine, 

 and he successfully accomplished it in a single season. Trees of various 

 sorts, from twenty-five to thirty feet high, w^ere then first planted as 

 standards or grove wood, at the distance of from eighteen to five-and- 

 twenty feet, and the intervals were filled up with bushes, or stools of 

 copse or underwood, from four to six feet in height, and five and six 

 feet asunder. Thus, the appearance of a plantation of considerable 

 standing was immediately obtained, and the eye efi'ectually prevented 

 from wandering among the stems, and discovering the actual extent of 

 the boundary. 



As the approach passes through this mass of wood for about four 

 hundred yards, we had an opportunity of viewing it to great advantage. 

 The uncommon beauty, luxuriance, and closeness of the wood, together 

 with the retired and sequestered appearance of the spot, struck us as 

 particularly pleasing, contrasted as it was with the open lawn, which 

 we had just before left. Here the standard trees, of course, were seen 

 to make freer shoots than those w^hich stood singly upon the open 

 ground, and the shoots of the underw^ood greater still. The underwood 

 consists of Oak, Witch-Elm, Beech, Birch, Holly, Hazel,'Mountain-Ash, 

 Thorn, Chestnut, English and Norway Maple, Common and Canadian 

 Birdscherry, and such other plants as are usually found in natural 

 woods ; and from the shelter and warmth produced by such a mass of 

 plantation, the luxuriance of these plants seemed wonderful — the shoots 

 extending, in some instances of the Maple, Elm, and Birdscherry, and 

 even of the Oak, to three and four feet in length and upwards. 



This plantation, which has all the natural luxuriance and wild rich- 

 ness of a natural copse, intermingled with grove or standard trees, had 

 been formed only four years ; and we are confident that no less a space 

 than from five-and-twenty to forty years, according to situation and 

 climate, could have produced the same effect by the usual process of 

 planting and thinning out. 



