Sept. 1, 1865.] THE TECHNOLOGIST. 
ON TRUFFLES. 
83 
attained the age of ten or twelve years, truffles were found in the 
intervals between the trees. This process was carried on in the neigh- 
bourhood of Loudun, where truffle-beds had formerly existed, but where 
they had long ceased to be productive — a fact indicating the aptitude of 
the soil for the purpose. In this case no attempt was made to produce 
truffles by placing ripe specimens in the earth ; but they sprung up of 
themselves, from spores probably contained in the soil. The young 
trees were left rather wide apart, and were cut for the first time about 
the twelfth year from the sowing, and afterwards at intervals of from 
seven to nine years. Truffles were thus obtained from a period of from 
twenty -five to thirty years, after which the plantations ceased to be pro- 
ductive, owing, it was said, to the ground being too much shaded by 
the branches of the young trees, a remedy for which might have been 
found by thinning out the trees ; but this would not be adopted till all 
the barren tracts, called " galluches," had been planted. The brushwood, 
by being thus thinned out, would be converted into timber-trees, and 
the truffle-grounds rendered permanent like those of Poitou, which are 
commonly situated under the shade of lofty trees. It is the opinion of 
the Messrs. Tulasne that the regular cultivation of truffles in gardens 
can never be so successful as this so-called indirect culture at Loudun, 
&c. ; but they think that a satisfactory result might be obtained in suit- 
able soils by planting fragments of mature truffles in wooded localities, 
taking care that the other conditions of the spots selected should be 
analogous to those of the regular truffle-grounds ; and they recommend 
a judicious thinning of the trees, and clearing the surface from brush- 
wood, &c, which prevents at once the beneficial effects of rain and of 
the direct sun-rays. It is added that this species of industry has added 
much to the value of certain districts of Loudun and Civray, which 
were previously comparatively worthless, and has enriched many of its 
proprietors, who now take periodical sowings of acorns, thus bringing in 
a certain portion of wood as truffle-grounds each year. At Bonardeline, 
for instance, the annual return from truffles in a plantation of less than 
half an acre was from Al. to -hi. Another case is adduced in the Arron- 
dissement of Apt, where several proprietors have made .plantations : the 
trees are left about five or six yards apart ; and so soon as their branches 
meet and shade the ground too much they are thinned out. 
The districts of England especially suited to produce truffles would 
thus appear to be situated on the great band of calcareous beds which 
run diagonally across the island from the south-eastern corner of Devon- 
shire to the mouth of the Wash in Norfolk, occupying all the country 
that lies to the south-east of such a line, including the counties of 
Somerset, Dorset, Wilts, Gloucester, Hampshire, Berkshire, Kent, Hert- 
fordshire, and parts of Northampton, Norfolk and Lincoln ; and it is to 
the proprietors of lands in those districts that we must look for any 
successful attempts to cultivate these fungi. 
A great proportion of the truffles exposed for sale in Covent Garden 
