310 



A DISCOURSE 



BOOK I. I had some seeds sent me, which I have sown with tolerable success ; 



'"""s'^^ and I prefer them before any other, because they grow both very erect, 

 and fixing themselves stoutly, need little or no support. Near Loch- 

 broom, betwixt the loch and a hill, they grow in such quantity, that, 



so that each kind of tree is always found rooted in the places where they stand in their 

 proper soil ; and there is no doubt to be made but that they originally grew there. When 

 we have thus found that all the fossile trees we meet with once grew in the places where 

 they are now buried, it is plain that in these places there were once notable forests, which 

 have been destroyed at some time ; and the question only remains how and by whom they 

 were destroyed. This we have reason to believe, by the Roman coins found among them, 

 was done by the people of that empire, and that at the time when they were established 

 or establishing themselves here. Their own historian tells us, that when their armies pur- 

 sued the wild Britons, these people always sheltered themselves in the miry woods, and 

 low watery forests. Caesar expressly says thisj and observes, that Cassibelan and his 

 Britons, after their defeat, passed the Thames, and fled into such low morasses and woods, 

 that there was no pursuing them : and we find that the Silures secured themselves in the 

 same manner when attacked by Ostorius and Agricola. The same thing is recorded of 

 Venutius, king of the Brigantes, who fled, to secure himself, into the boggy forests of the 

 midland part of this kingdom : and Herodian expressly says, that in the time of the Romans 

 pushing their conquests in these islands, it was the custom of the Britons to secure them- 

 selves in the thick forests which grew in their boggy and wet places, and when opportu- 

 nity offered to issue out thence, and fall upon the Romans. The consequence of all this 

 was the destroying all these forests ; the Romans finding themselves so plagued with 

 ))arties of the natives isuing out upon them at times from these forests, gave orders 

 fdr the cutting down and destroying all the forests in Britain which grew on boggy 

 and wet grounds. These orders were punctually executed ; and to this it is owing that at 

 this day we can hardly be brought to believe that such forests ever grew with us as are 

 now found buried. The Roman histories all join in telling us, that when Suetonius 

 Paulinus conquered Anglesea, he ordered all the woods to be cut down there, in the manner 

 of the Roman generals in England: and Galen tells us, that the Romans, after their con- 

 quest in Britain, kept their soldiers constantly employed in cutting down forests, draining 

 of marshes, and paving of bogs. Not only the Roman soldiers were employed in this 

 manner, but all the native Britons made captives in the wars were obliged to assist in it: 

 and Dion Cassius tells us, that the Emperor Severus lost no less than 50,000 men in a few 

 years' time in cutting down the woods and draining the bogs of this island. It is not to 

 be wondered at, that such numbers executed the immense destruction which we find in 

 these buried forests. One of the greatest subterranean treasures of wood is tliat near 

 Hatfield ; and it is easy to prove, that these people, to whom this havock is thus attri- 

 buted, were upon the spot where these trees now lie buried. The common road of the 

 Romans out of the south into the north, was formerly from Lindum (Lincoln) to Segelochum, 

 (Little Burrow upon Trent,) and from thence to Danum, (Doncaster,) where they kept a 

 standing garrison of Crispinian horse. A little off on the east and north-east of their road, 



