The Willow. 



hundred. Tliere stands the hop-planter, hoUling out the 

 fifty shillings; and this sight, this charming and tempting 

 sight, soon overpowers that philosophy, which teaches the 

 coppice-owner that he would gain the fifty shillings, ten 

 times told, perhaps, by using the poles in the making of a 

 new coppice. Nay (and this is a great deal worse) the 

 planter may have to hiy the poles, while any neighbour 

 will give him the truncheons, and it certainly requires a 

 little less expense to put in the truncheons than to buy the 

 poles. Faith ! here is a great deal more than sufficient to 

 decide the question in favour of the truncheons, which thus 

 become living and gay tenants of the coppice, instead of 

 making their exit in the fiery furnace of a baker, or in the 

 still more ardent flame of the lime-kiln. 



577* However, I did once see a man that raised a coppice 

 fi'om Willow Poles, and it was worth, acre for acre, and 

 at parallel age, four times as much as any other Willow 

 coppice that I ever saw in my life. It was next to impos- 

 sible to 'svork one's way through it. It was about seven 

 years old ; it was fit then to cut for hoops and hurdles ; 

 and I believe it sold by auction, the next year, for thirty- 

 five pounds an acre, though the general run of coppices 

 did not fetch, at that age, more than seven or eight pounds 

 an acre; and, if I recollect rightly, the poles had been 

 laid only about fourteen or fifteen years. But the trun- 

 cheons could have been had for nothing, while these poles 

 must have been worth forty or fifty shillings a hundred. 



578. These poles, however, need not be prime poles. 

 They ought to be stout, but need not be of great length ; 

 and, if a little crooked, it is of no great consequence. By 

 lowering the earth in certain places, raising it in others, 

 and with the iise of pegs to fasten down the ends of 



