OF FOREST-TREES. 



293 



stalks by sifting some more earth about them, especially the Pines, which cH. XXI I 

 being more top-heavy, are more apt to swag. When they are of two or '"-^'V^*' 

 three years' growth, you may transplant them where you please ; and 

 when they have gotten good root, they will make prodigious shoots, but 

 not for the first three or four years comparatively. They will grow both 

 in moist and barren gravel, and poor ground, so it be not over sandy and 



to me by James Farquharson, Esq. upon the method of raising the Larch and the Scotch 

 Pine, will, I flatter myself, be highly acceptable. Such liberal communications deserve 

 greatly of the public. 



Marlee, C Scotland,) June 22, 177 5. 

 " II. In order to raise plantations of the Scotch Fir, let the cones be 



" gathered in the month of February, or March, from thriving young trees, as the old ones 

 "are not easily accessible, nor so productive of seed. These are to be exposed to the 

 " heat of the sun, thinly spread on any kind of coarse canvas, taking them under cover 

 "in the night-time, and only exposing them when the sun shines. This soon makes the 

 " cones expand with a crackling noise. W^hen any quantity of the seed is shed, it must 

 " be separated from the cones by a scarce, otherwise the first-dropped seeds would become 

 " too dry before the cones yielded their whole quantity, which often takes up a consider- 

 " able time ; so that we are sometimes obliged to dry the cones in kilns, to make them 

 "give their contents in time for sowing — which ought to be done the end of April 

 ^'or beginning of May. The first method of procuring the seed is certainly the most 

 " eligible, though the other answers very well when attentively performed, so as not to 

 " damage the seed by too much heat. A light loamy soil, trenched a foot and a half deep, 

 "and laid out in beds five feet broad, answers the best for sowing. Let the seeds 

 " be sown very thick, and covered with a thick sifting of mould from the alleys. Plants 

 " raised in this manner will rise like a brush. No kind of manure should be given to the 

 " beds, as productive of weeds ; the drawing of which not only brings up many of the 

 " tender plants, but loosens the ground, and makes blanks that let in frosts in winter, and 

 " drought in summer. To give an idea of the sowing, I never consider my crop of plants 

 " good, unless I have above a thousand in each foot long of the beds, that is, in five square 

 " feet. Upon their having two seasons growth, I plant them out irregularly from the 

 "seed-bed, about three feet asunder, upon the mountainous grounds where they are 

 " to rise to perfection. I begin to plant the driest ground in autumn, eighteen months 

 " after sowing, and persist in this operation until the frost prevents me, I begin again in 

 " February, or rather as the weather admits, and continue this work sometimes to the end 

 " of April, so as to plant out the product of the two-year old seed-beds. I put the plants 

 " into the ground with two cuts of a spade, thus > . I raise the point of the angle with 

 " what we call a dibble, and laying the plant up to the neck, stamp down the raised sod 

 " with the foot. In this method, two men may plant a thousand in a day. When the 

 " ground is rocky, or very stony, I use a dibble, shod with iron, having a cleft at the 

 " extremity to lead down the root, putting the plants into the ground in the manner that 



