PLANTING FOREST-TREES. 
99 Q 
A*. l/ 
earlli than the dictated mark P From experience, I can prove at this 
time, from trees at the planting of which T was present, that every 
species of tree will do better when planted a sufficient depth ; and 
from the observations I have made, and from what I have been able 
to select, I am confident that the success of planting was better, 
years back, than at the present time. 
We are very apt to run to extremes, and when the first novelty is 
over, another search is made, which generally terminates in any 
thing but a practice founded on experience. I am avvare, that many 
will widely differ in opinion from me oil this subject, but I refer 
them to the first tree they may meet with of any size, which will 
afford a rationale to the argument. 
We may calculate, if these rules are followed, that a burden will 
be removed from the shoulders of many nurserymen, which they 
have been undeservedly obliged to bear for the last thirty years, 
without the least hopes of ever escaping from its weight, by the seri¬ 
ous losses in planting being referred to a right cause. 
If proofs are wanting of the utility of deeper planting, I need tra¬ 
vel no further than the plantations at Willersley, which were all 
performed in the manner recommended, and which excel in extent 
and elevation those of any other proprietor in this part of the coun¬ 
try. I am also prepared to prove, that the success was excellent, 
indeed beyond expectation, for although it was a constant practice 
for many years to plant upwards of fifty thousand trees annually, 
upon as high ground as almost any in Derbyshire, such was the suc¬ 
cess, that the individual who superintended the planting for the last 
forty years, is ready to attest, that scarcely a plant has been known 
to fail. 
From the position in which the roots now lie, and from the pro¬ 
gress the trees have made, added to situation and quality of earth, 
there is good reasons for recommending a similar practice to be pur¬ 
sued in other and similar situations. I also think there is just 
ground for condemning the system of shallow planting. I would 
advise all who feel prejudiced in favour of the latter, to examine any 
tree which has been growing twenty, thirty, or forty years, and then 
I think it will be inferred, that in no case does nature exert herself 
more than in the disposition and arrangement of the roots of forest 
trees. Gardeners all know what prodigious progress the roots of 
trees annually make in their heaps of compost. I find at this place, 
that their annual progress is as much as five feet in a heap of com¬ 
post, and I have good reason to believe, that their growth would be 
double, if the soil was suitable for them. 
