94< 



A DISCOURSE 



BOOK r. that I dare boldly affirm, more than an hundred years advance is clearly 

 ■^'V"^*' gained by soil and husbandry. I have yet read, that there grow Oaks 

 (some of which have contained ten loads apiece) out of the very walls 

 of Silcester in Hampshire, which seem to strike root in the very stones r 



The several sorts of Fir-trees, from appearance, seem to promise a greater shelter ; 

 " but on tlie forest-land they do not grow so fast, as the former, and what is worse, the 

 " Oak will not thrive under them, as they do immediately under the Birch. 



" Where a plantation is on a plain, a screen of Firs for its boundary is of singular 

 " use, but the situation of the forest-land denies us this advantage. 



" We continue to cut down the taU-g rowing weeds two or three times the first summer 

 " and perhaps once the next, or second season after planting ; which is all that we do in 

 " respect to cleaning. The next winter after planting, we fill up the places with fresh 

 " plants where they have miscarried : after which there is little to be done till about the 

 " fourth or fifth year ; by which time the small sized Birch, and seedling Oaks, will be 

 " grown to a proper size for transplanting : In the thinning of these, due care must be had 

 " not to take too many away in one season, but being properly managed, there will be a 

 " supply of plants for at least half a dozen years to come. 



" About the same time that the lesser-sized Birch want thinning, the large ones will 

 " require to have their lower branches taken off, so as to keep them from injuring the 

 " Oaks ; and this is the first profit of our plantations ; the Birch-wood being readily bought 

 " up by the broom-makers. This pruning we continue as often as required, till the 

 " Birches are grown to a sufficient size to make rails for fencing ; we then cut them down 

 " to make room for their betters. 



" By this time the Oaks will be grown to the height of twelve or fourteen feet, when 

 " they draw themselves up exceedingly fast : Each plant seems as it were in a state 

 " of strife with its neighbour, and in a strict sense they are so, and on no other terms 

 " than life for life ; and he whose fate it is to be once over-topped, is soon after compelled 

 " to give up the contest for ever. 



" After the Birches are cut down, there is nothing more to be done but thinning the 

 " Oaks, from time to time, as may be required, and cutting off their dead branches 

 " as frequently as may be necessary. We are very cautious in doing the former, knowing 

 " well, that if Ave can but once obtain length of timber, time will bring it into thickness ; 

 " therefore we let them grow very close together for the first fifty years. 



" And here it may not be improper to observe the progress the Oak makes with 

 " us, by describing them in two of our plantations, one of twenty-eight, the other of fifty 

 " years growth. In' the former they are in general about twenty-five or twenty-six feet 

 " in height, and in girth about eighteen inches : The trees [in the latter, planted in 1725, 

 " are something more than sixty feet in height, and in girth a little above three feet ; 

 " and these trees are in general about fifty feet in the bole, from which you will easily 

 " conceive the smallness of their tops, even at this age. 



" It would be a difficult matter to describe their farther progress with any degree 

 " of certainty, therefore let it suffice to make this last observation on them in their mature 

 " state. 



