232 
CONIFERS AND TAXADS. 
On the kind of soil most suitable for Conifers, &c., it may be well brief!, 
to remark, that no very particular selection is necessary ; pure loam is that whic ( 
they most delight in, and naturally, we know, they succeed to a considerabl 
extent in peat. It is not, however, the soil they actually root into, so much as th 
subsoil or under-strata, that conduces to their welfare ; if that within a foot o 
eighteen inches of the surface is chalk, limestone, or any other rock, it matters no 
how low or how elevated the situation, there Conifers, &c. will be most at hom 
and flourish in a remarkably luxuriant manner. A small plantation of commoi 
Spruce and Scotch Firs ( Abies excelsa and Pinus sylvestris), in which those tree: 
display a luxuriance rarely met with, occurs to our recollection, and which we wil 
give a short account of, as an illustration of the correctness of what we advance upoi 
this head. 
The site of the plantation is a position apparently the very reverse of appro 
priate for Conifers, being low, but an examination of its soil discovers that appear 
ances are no criterion in this instance ; it is found to be eighteen inches or so in depth, £ 
poor brown loam resting on a limestone rock, fragments of whose substance constitute 
a third of the material the trees are rooting into ; they were planted at the usuai 
distance asunder, and afterwards, as they grew, repeatedly thinned out ; but notwith- 
standing, by the time they had attained an altitude of from fifteen to twenty feet, had 
extended nearly as much in diameter at their base, and formed a close thicket by the' 
individual trees commingling their branches with those of each other. A relation ol 
facts like these have a direct bearing upon our subject by showing what kind of situa- 
tion, as far as their welfare is dependent upon their roots, Conifers, &c. admirably 
succeed in. It should be understood, we are not very solicitous about the welfare of 
a Spruce or Scotch Fir, but would have our readers learn that the conditions of soil 
and situation under which either luxuriates are equally favourable to a similar attain- 
ment by the most beautiful species in this valuable Order. We are well aware 
naturally provided situations, appropriate in the requisite particular, are very seldom 
met with in pleasure-grounds or within their precincts, but that does not render a 
knowledge that such situations are most suitable less valuable, but rather on the 
contrary enhances its worth, for, possessing it, we are enabled to set about producing 
the state of things we require. A locality in which moisture is stagnant, either in 
the soil or atmosphere, is very unsuited to the growth of Conifers, &c. ; the soil, 
however, chiefly, should be free of this element in excess, and if it is not the case 
naturally with any in which it is desired to have them, it must be rendered so. The 
proper way of planting, that is, elevating the individual planted by placing it on a 
mound of earth, considerably raised above the surrounding surface, much enhances 
the certainty that injurious influences do not arise, having wet for their origin. 
Planting in this way too is of further importance. But first to complete what we 
have to say of planting : it may be thought that raising a mound of soil eighteen 
inches to two feet high, and of proportionate extent in circumference, would be inad- 
missible on a level lawn, or in other conspicuous points of view ; it is not however 
