310 
Farminc/ of Hampshire. 
gunpowder ; but good-sized sticks are required for this, such as 
may more usually be found in hedgerows, or by the water side, 
than in plantations. The Crimean war gave a great impulse to 
the traffic in alders. Many were searched out and cut down then, 
which would not have been thought of, but for the increased 
demand for gunpowder. A working woodman of this' country is 
said to have cleared 300/. in one year by embarking in this trade. 
He gave 30s. a stack for the wood delivered at the nearest railway 
station, and made his profit by retailing it to those who undertook 
Government contracts. 
Another particular in Lord Eversley's management deserves 
mention. He had a swampy, bad water meadow. Instead of 
attempting to improve it, he planted it with osiers, which did so 
well, that they were cut the year after setting, and were sold by 
auction at 60Z. for 5|- acres. Here is an anticipation of the period 
of expectation allotted by Lord Bacon. " In planting of woods 
you must make account to leese [lose] almost twenty years' profit, 
and expect your recompense in the end." And yet there has 
been at Heckfield no " base and hasty drawing of profit in the 
first years," for the cut of osiers will not be less in each succeed- 
ing year, if the plants be well attended to. Lord Eversley has 
reaped the early harvest, and not despised the caution, " speedy 
piofit is not to be neglected, as far as it may stand with the good 
of the plantation, but no further."* But the 12/. an acre are not 
all profit. Osier beds are not remunerative, except they be kept 
clean : in early spring, in a dry time, the hoe must enter them, 
and not cease working, till the young branches cover the ground, 
and smother the weeds. 
As we proceed from the north-east, across the chalk, to the 
south-Avest, we have evidence of the remark that the value of 
underwood decreases, just in proportion to distance from the hop 
country, and the demand for poles there. At Heckfield and 
Dogmersfield, it is at its highest ; at the Vyne, lower ; at Tangier 
and Laverstoke, lower still, but as yet more valuable than the 
timber trees ; at Hursley, it has some value, but now less than 
the timber ; while at Minstead, there is a question whether the 
underwood is worth preserving, and whether cattle should not be 
turned in to graze among the trees. 
The more valuable underwood on the chalk is ash and hazel. 
A new plantation of this will come, in ten years, to a sufficient 
growth, and may be cut, every successive ten years, for the first 
fifty years. After that period it becomes " old wood," and its 
intervals of rest must be twelve or fourteen years. The price 
* Bacon's Essay ' Of Plantations ' (colonies). 
