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constantly kept clean from weeds: in May they should be inured to the open air, and when they 
are removed out of the bed, they should have a shady situation. These plants should not be dis¬ 
turbed the first season, but as they are often injured by frost when young, in October the pots 
should be placed under a frame, where they may be screened from hard frosts, but in mild weather 
they should be constantly opened to enjoy the free air. The leaves of these plants fall away in the 
autumn, so that some persons have supposed them dead, and have thrown them out of the pots. In 
the spring, before the plants begin to push, they should be carefully shaken out of the pots, and 
separated; part of them should be planted singly into small pots, and the other may be planted in 
a bed of light earth in a warm situation. If those which are planted in the small pots are plunged 
in a moderate hot-bed, it will greatly forward their growth; but they must be early inured to 
bear the open air, otherwise they will draw up weak. In the following summer they must have 
a shady situation, and the next winter should be sheltered again; the spring following they may be 
shaken out of the pots, and planted where they are designed to remain. Those plants which were 
planted in the bed, will require protection from the frost the first winter; but if the surface of the 
ground is covered with old tanners bark, it will prevent the frost from penetrating to their roots; 
and if in hard frosts, some straw, peas-haulm, or any light covering is laid over the bed, it will 
secure their stems from being injured. The plants in the bed may remain there two years, by which 
time they will be strong enough to transplant to the places where they are designed to grow. As 
these plants do not come out very early in the spring, they often continue growing pretty late in the 
autumn, which causes the extreme parts of their shoots to be very tender, whereby they often suffer 
from the early frosts in autumn, which frequently kill the upper parts of the shoots: but as their 
woody stems are seldom injured, they put out new branches below: and if in very severe winters 
the stems are destroyed, yet the roots will remain, and put out new ones the following summer. 
Species 2, 3. Both these sorts are easily propagated by seeds, which are generalty produced in 
plenty. These should be sown in the autumn soon after they are ripe, for those which are sown 
in the spring, never grow the same year, so that a whole season is gained by the sowing in autumn. 
When the plants appear, they must be kept clean from weeds during the summer, and in the 
autumn following, when their leaves decay, the roots may be taken up, and transplanted where 
they are to remain. They are very hardy plants, so may be planted in any situation; and as they 
grow naturally in woods, they may be planted in wilderness quarters, under trees, where, although 
they have no great beauty, yet they will add to the variety. 
Genus 6. Betula. Birch and Alder. Class XXL Monoecia. 
Order IY. Tetrandria. 
Species 1. White Birch-tree. (Betula Alba.) 
For the country whence it came, the time it was introduced here, and its uses, Vide last 
Section, p. 386. 
Species 2. Black Virginia Birch-tree. (Betula Nigra.) 
This rises to a grand and magnificent tree, and reaches upwards of sixty feet in height, and is 
equally hardy with the European white Birch. It has been hitherto propagated chiefly for orna¬ 
mental plantations; but it is to be hoped that it will be admitted also among our forest trees.^ It 
* Hunter. 
