HORTICULTURAL JOURiSTAL. 225 
HEDGES. 
The subject of hedge fences is, just now, the most important one before 
us. Every year, as timber becomes scarcer, the necessity for some substi- 
tute for posts and rails becomes more apparent. One of the most expensive 
items in a farmer's accounts is his fencing bill ; none is better acquainted 
with this fact than himself. That he does not immediately give live hedges 
the preference, is simply because, with all his knowledge of the enormous 
cost of the present system, he believes that, without a cost still greater, 
live fences can never be made equal to the wooden ones in value for all the 
purposes to which " post and rails" are put. I must confess that when I 
look at live fences everywhere around me, there is good reason for this indif- 
ference or dislike to the " nev»'-fangled" notion. In a circle of twenty miles 
here, where there has been numerous attempts at hedging, I do not think I 
could point to a single instance in which a genuine agriculturist would give it 
the preference to a good post and rail fence. If there is such a specimen, 
I would be glad to know where. Under such a state of things, there is little 
justice in the continual abuse heaped on our farmers for their " old fogyism," 
in a tenacious adherence to an old system, which, with all its expense, they 
know to be good. As a class, they are certainly not a scientific body of 
men, but as keen calculators of questions of profit and loss, they will be 
found, on a more intimate acquaintance, to be not so very far behind the age. 
They are continually reminded of the hedges of Europe by newspaper 
writers, and gentlemanly travellers, who hold up these affairs as models 
worthy of our imitation. I am assured by those well acquainted with the 
subject, that good hedges there are the exception and not the rule ; and 
that these are kept up at an enormous annua.1 expense. I am further 
assured, that much of what effectiveness European hedges do possess is 
owing more to the " ditches " which are there used as legal boundaries to 
property, as well as to divide " one field " from another, than to any great 
merit in the hedge itself. These hedges, for the most part, are full of what 
they call "gaps," or open spaces made by the breaking through of boys, 
sportsmen, and " other " unruly cattle ; . and after every twice-yearly trim- 
ming which they receive, a horse and man is employed in carting the clip- 
pings to these open spaces, and which are there used to mend the " gaps " 
with. These facts are generally known to our farmers, through their hired 
men, though rarely or never explained to them through their agricultural 
papers. Coupled with such poor examples of hedging as they witness from 
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