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our well-cultivated farms, our well-mauured gardens, 
our splendid conservatories and flower-gardens, all dili¬ 
gently cared for and attended to, which is all right, 
proper, and highly commendable. Yet, why not attend 
to our lorest lands also? Surely, when wo remember 
that the wooden walls of old England are our glory and 
defence, and that upon their efficiency and due support 
almost our very existence, as a nation, depends; remem¬ 
bering, also, that these same floating defences are formed 
principally out of our own noble Oak, the glory of our 
island, 1 say, surely we ought to devote a part of the 
energies of our strong-armed countrymen to the culture 
of our woods. 
I have had these ideas floating in my brain for some 
time, and having, as our readers well know (by my 
“Jottings by the Way”), frequent opportunities, during 
my long journies, of seeing different gardens, I often 
had my attention drawn to tho state of the woods and 
forests in various parts of the country. I have endea¬ 
voured, in my papers on “ Coniferm,” to invite such as 
have it in their power to encourage the planting of the 
more valuable timber species as timber, as well as for 
ornament, 1 trust with some little good effect; and I 
purpose, now I am from home, away from books and 
my chimney corner, to write a few, perhaps rambling, 
ideas on the state of woods, plantations, or forests, as 
they have come under my observation during the last 
quarter-of-a-century, together with a few practical hints 
on their improvement and increase by planting waste 
lands. 
The state of many, far too many, of the woods of this 
country is most deplorable. A contemporary gardening 
publication has lately shown how wretchedly the na¬ 
tional woods and forests are managed, with much force 
and truth. I have seen some of them, and can bear 
witness to that truth. The reason is, that men are ap¬ 
pointed to manage these forests who have had no expe¬ 
rience in wood-craft: hence they cut down trees that 
ought to stand, and leave such as ought to be cut down; 
besides, also, cutting-down too many at once, merely to 
make a sale, to show an increase of income for the time; 
such sales being most ruinous to tho income of after 
years; putting ono in mind of the impatient, unthinking 
boy, who killed his goose that produced golden eggs, to, 
a ? ! 10 -foolishly imagined, have all his treasures at once. 
This principle has been carried-out to a great extent in 
tho public forest lands of our country. 
Let not the private owners of woods think that they J 
are altogether unblameable in this respect, because they, 
or their immediate predecessors, have planted largo 
tracts of waste or unprofitable lands, and have not cut 
any down, but left them all to grow. This is quite as 
great a mistake as too severe thinning; and in this state 
I find, with some honourable exceptions, are the plant¬ 
ations of woods belonging to private individuals. In 
fact, you can hardly ride ten miles through any part of 
the country but you come across, plantations of timber 
trees of some twenty or thirty years old, but which are 
so thick that they are drawn up into little better than 
fishing rods; or, if some would-be-knowing-one has re¬ 
commended the thinning process to be commenced forth¬ 
with, then down come nine-tenths, or, perhaps, more; 
and then tho tall, rather slender ones left behind are 
driven about with the winds, and scarcely one in ten ever 
recovers this starving process. Then, again, there are 
many tracts of woodland that are planted without due 
preparation ; tho plants are had from some nursery, and 
stuck in anyhow, and these are expected to grow and 
form timber! 
I once had a practical illustration of this careless and 
injudicious way of cramming in as many trees as pos¬ 
sible into a tract of land without any care. When I 
first entered the service of T. Brocklehurst, Esq., I was 
desired to survey a piece of forestry that had been 
December 8. 
planted four or five years, and, as he said, had not grown 
at all to his satisfaction. Accordingly, I inspected the 
plantation. I found Oaks, Ashes, Elms, and Larches, all 
planted very thickly on a wet swamp, many of them were 
dead, and those that were alive had not grown as maDy 
inches as they had been planted years. On the ground, 
here and there, were several largo Alders laid on one 
side by the wind, for even this water-loving tree had no 
roots to sustain such heavy tops. To remedy this state 
ol things, I proposed first to cut down and dispose of all 
these old useless trees, and, when they were removed, to 
have the ground thoroughly deep drained, and these 
drains to be open ones. My project was approved and 
carried into effect. The old Alders were removed, and 
drains cut across tho ground six feet deep, and eighteen 
feet from drain to drain. All the soil from each drain 
was cast on the surface right and left, and levelled down 
amongst the young trees. The good effects of these 
operations were soon manifest; the removing the old 
crankey trees allowed a freer circulation again amongst 
tho young trees, and this destroyed the lichens and 
mosses, and the deep ditches effectually drained the soil 
for the roots. The following year many of the trees grew 
a toot or more higher, and the year following, some even 
advanced as much as three feet in height, with a pro¬ 
portionate increase in thickness of stem. The cure was 
complete. So rapidly did they grow, that 1 was obliged 
the third year to thin them out greatly. I made use of 
them to plant in other places, especially the hedge¬ 
rows of the farms on the estate. I have been told, tho 
trees are now (that is, twelve years after being properly 
drained) many of them thirty feet high, with stems six 
inches in diameter. 
Here is a practical and now living example of what 
may be done with young unhealthy plantations. Inmy 
next, I will give examples how over-crowded plantations 
should be judiciously thinned. T. Abpleby. 
(_To be continued .) 
TRENCHING GROUND IN AUTUMN. 
I he subject to which I now beg to call attention is 
the tillage ot ground in autumn, of which some difference 
in opinion yet exists; some insisting that all vacant 
ground, without any exception^ ought to be at once 
turned-up, unless it be so much soddeued by rain as to 
I prevent its being done without injuring it by the con¬ 
solidation its component parts receive in the progress 
ot digging, forking over, or ploughing, as the case may 
be. Now, there are many who yet believe that a certain 
description of heavy laud is better lying in rather a 
solid state through tho wet months of winter than being 
turned-up rough for the action of the wind and frost to 
pulverize. 
YVidely different as these notions are, they are, in 
their respective cases, both right, as instances can be 
shown wherein their efficacy can be proved by the 
best ot all tests—experience; and such results will 
present different aspects ; in one case, a fine friable 
compost will be leit on the top of ground dug or 
ploughed-up in autumn, and exposed to a winter’s frost; 
in another, tho triable, or looser matter, will be very 
small indeed, and all below it as stiff and sour as if it 
were intended for bricks or earthenware ; these different 
results, arising from causes for which the season is least 
ot all to be blamed, forms, however, a very important 
problem in horticulture, or the tillage of land. This, 
however, must bo solved in accordance with certain 
circumstances to be named hereafter; and, in tho first 
place, 1 may observe, that where garden ground will 
not allow ot being dug in tho autumn, there is some¬ 
thing radically wrong in the management it has re¬ 
ceived; lor, where ground had been some time under 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
