with minuteness that which they had not seen in practice, having little doubt, that they may prevail on Sir Henry himself to afford these details, in the form of an appendix to this report.

Upon the whole, it is humbly their opinion, that Sir Henry, by philosophical attention to the nature of the change to which he was about to subject the trees which he has transplanted, has attained, at no extravagant expense, the power so long desired of anticipating the slow progress of vegetation, and accomplishing, within two or three seasons, those desirable changes on the face of nature, which he who plants in early youth can, in ordinary cases, only hope to witness in advanced life.

Signed, by order of the Committee,

ALEX. YOUNG.

HINTS RELATIVE TO PLANTING,

FOR THE HONOURABLE SIR A. J. C.

TO PLANT AN ACRE OF GOOD LAND.

LET the ground be covered with plants of Oak and Ash, two years transplanted at least ;-three-fourths of the former, and one-fourth of the latter, according to the nature of the ground, and at the distance of nine feet from plant to plant. Then fill up the intervals with Scotch Firs and Larches, one year transplanted, and equal numbers of each. So that, when the whole plantation is finished, the plants shall stand about four and a half feet asunder. Thus, there will be rather better than three thousand on a Scotch acre.

If the plantation be near the mansion house, or in any other situation where ornament is required, a few Sycamores or Planes and Elms, English and Scotch, may be interspersed. In such situations also, the Lime, Beech, Sweet Chestnut, and Horse Chestnut will make a pleasing variety; and all these extra trees are free growers on good land. The Beech, however, will thrive tolerably when the land is very indifferent.

TO PLANT AN ACRE OF POOR LAND.

Let the better parts of the ground (especially where it tends to clay,) be covered with Oak and Ash, two years transplanted as above, and equal numbers of each, at the distance of seven feet from plant to plant. Then fill up the intervals with Scotch Firs and Larches, one

year transplanted, equal numbers of each; so that, when the plantation is finished, the plants shall stand three and a half feet asunder making between four and five thousand on a Scotch acre.

Let the worse parts of the ground, which are unable to produce Oak and Ash, (I mean particularly where the soil is shallow, dry, and sandy, or consists of a mixture of sand and moss or peat,) be covered with Birch and Mountain Ash, equal numbers of each. The plants to stand seven feet asunder, as above; and the intervals to be filled with Scotch Firs and Larches, as already mentioned. If the ground be damp, the Alder may be substituted for the Mountain Ash.

It is understood that, on either good land or bad, the forest trees should, in general, be pitted; but, where the ground spades easily, and great care is taken to introduce the plant at the point of the spade, and to avoid curling up its roots, slitting may be permitted; but these considerations are seldom or never sufficiently attended to, even by workmen who esteem themselves experienced in the operation. The Larches and Scotch Firs may always be planted by means of the slit.

It is further to be observed, that the above hints are very general; and, in order to be properly understood, they would require a volume of illustration, which is not intended in this place. For example, an experienced planter knows that the Oak will not thrive in very light thin soils. Even a damp soil is more favourable to that plant than one of thin dry sand. And it is ascertained that the Ash will thrive in situations which are either too wet or too dry for the Oak. The Beech is the only tree that resembles the Ash in this particular; and it will grow on ground too poor, barren, and dry for raising the Ash.

Further-Of all the plants above-mentioned, the least valuable is the Alder; but it will grow in absolute bog, where no other plant, the Willow excepted, will live. No plants will be found to cover very poor, thin, light, and mossy land, with so good a prospect of a return to the planter, as Mountain Ash and Birch; because the wood of the latter is useful in several trades; and the bark of both sells for one-half the price of Oak bark.

There are two great objects which every Planter has in view-the one is beauty, and the other utility, or a return in profit for the money laid out. As the planting, and particularly the enclosing and draining of ground properly for wood, are works of considerable expense, it is important that a landowner should not suffer himself to be misled by the interested representations of nurserymen and others, who recommend various trees of little or no value, in order to get quit of such commodities, when they happen to be upon their hands.

From the experience of more than five-and-thirty years, in the plant

ing, cutting, and disposing of wood of almost every species known in this island, I must declare, that for purposes of utility, and to make a return in any degree proportioned to the money laid out, there are no trees so proper as the Oak and the Ash. It is a great, although not an uncommon error, to imagine that the Oak will not grow except on land of a superior quality; whereas the fact is, that it will grow to tolerable copsewood on very exposed situations and in almost any soil, light and thin sand excepted. The bark of the Oak (even when nothing higher than copsewood can be raised) is found to be more valuable than both the wood and the bark of any other tree; and to all general purposes there is no tree so universally applicable as the Ash,—even more so than the Oak itself.

It is therefore probable that the only trees worth planting with the view of profit to an estate, are the Oak and the Ash. In regard to beauty and ornament, no precise rule can be laid down. I have mentioned above the different kinds which, if planted on soils congenial to them, will have the best effects in a gentleman's park, and about his place.

In the foregoing hints, the Fir tribe has been considered merely as nurses to more valuable, or at least more permanent, plantations. But from the many successful experiments which have lately been made on the utility of the Larch, both on account of its wood and its bark, it may be doubted whether, on poor and exposed land, any return equally great will ever be made, as by planting it with Larch and Scotch Fir only, (three fourths of the former and one fourth of the latter)-cutting them down completely at the end of fifty or sixty years, and then planting the ground anew. On the other hand, however, it may be said of permanent woods, or woods consisting wholly of deciduous trees, that the oftener they are cut over, the more they will increase, both in value and vigour; whereas, a wood of the Fir species only, being of a temporary nature, as soon as it is cut down, it is at an end; and it seems rather uncertain whether, in the exhausted state of the ground after the first crop, it will ever rise again so well on being planted for the second time.

The following short injunctions, which are mostly of the negative sort, may perhaps be useful to the young planter. Never plant the Oak on a light sandy soil, if of a thin and shallow quality. In such a situation it never will become a tree, and seldom rise to the size of a vigorous bush. Never plant it upon real moss or peat, as it will become black at the heart. Never plant the Lime, Sycamore, or Horse-chestnut on wet or even loamy land with a clay bottom. All of these trees require depth, with a dry subsoil; but the Oak will thrive surprisingly well on very obdurate clay, both above and below. Never plant at all

without draining the ground completely, by means of open drains if requisite- -as all trees require a bottom more or less dry, and wet land in a plantation is so much waste or unproductive surface. On land inclining only to moss or peat, if properly drained, the Ash will grow well; if the soil approach to the nature of a blackish loam, one third part of Oak may be added. In a word, Oak and Ash are the staple plants for useful woods, just as wheat and oats are staple crops in husbandry. Other timber, if raised to a large size, may sell; but these two, even of very small dimensions, will always find a ready market. ALLANTON HOUSE,

13th July 1816.

RESUSCITATION OF OLD TREES.

"DEAR SIR,-Agreeably to my promise, I shall now give you an idea of my method of reviving or resuscitating old trees, which has often succeeded with myself, and which I have recommended to others; but there is no account given of it in the notes on my treatise on the application of the science of physiology to practical tree-culture, and particularly in removing large trees, for ornament or use.

"The decay of old trees, both in England and Scotland, has been a subject of general complaint during at least a century; and it is observed with regret, that their place does not promise to be very speedily supplied by existing woods and plantations. The general causes of the decay of trees are twofold. The first proceeds from diseases to which all woody plants are subject; the second from extreme old age, but more frequently from their having exhausted the pabulum within their reach. The pathology of the vegetable tribe, in this respect, differs materially from that of the human species. Among the sons of the forest, as among us, there are no vicious efforts made by individuals, by means of disease, to shorten life. There are no gourmands nor sensualists, by fatal indulgences and artificial luxuries, to bring on premature old age. The laws of nature in trees are allowed fairly to operate, and their existence therefore may be reckoned on, and even prolonged by art, to an indefinite period. It has been said that the roots of trees in a favourable soil will go abroad in search of their food to a distance from the stem equal to the entire height of the tree, taken from the ground; and wherever this is found to hold good, trees will live to a very great age, especially in a deep and calcareous soil.

"Of your two fine old trees at Westquarter, in Stirlingshire, which I lately examined, a holly and a double-flowering thorn, I must say that they appear to me to have declined chiefly from the latter of the two causes above mentioned, namely, their having exhausted the food or pabulum in their immediate neighbourhood; and, in the case of the thorn, in some measure from the ground being overstocked with other plants, that greatly crowd upon it, even to the exclusion of light and air, without which no plant can flourish. As to the holly, it seems stunted and hide-bound, and sends out no free shoots at top, such as a tree in health, in so fine a soil and climate, ought to do. The terminal growths of the thorn, also, have begun to decay; and if some salutary remedy be not speedily adopted, to excite the roots to fresh action, it is plain that the evil will ere long extend to the greater branches, and, as a necessary consequence, to the trunk itself.

"The first thing that I should recommend to be done with this noble thorn is, to cut away the ivy that now strongly adheres to it. That parasitical plant has covered nearly the whole external surface of the stem. It already intercepts the kindly influence of the sun and air from the bark of the tree, under which the finer vessels of the descending sap lie, so that it may be said to prey upon the very vitals of the plant. The next object should be, to clear the ground, for a considerable space, of overshadowing shrubs and bushes. So venerable a tree, standing single, would be the most graceful ornament of the verdant turf that surrounded it.

"The second thing that I would do, would be to dig a trench round the tree, not exceeding three and a half or four feet out from the stem; which trench should be five feet broad at least, and as deep as to penetrate through both the soil and subsoil, however deep either may be, until you reach the rock, gravel, pure sand, or obdurate clay (Scottice, till) that may lie below. In doing this, the workmen may fearlessly cut through all the roots they meet with, leaving only three or four great ones, on the south and south-west sides, to act as cables, in resisting the severe winds that usually blow from those quarters in every part of the island.

"Next: let whatever parts of the trench that consist of good earth, or of earth capable of being easily made so, be thrown aside, and the sand or gravel, if any, be wheeled away; so that you may obtain a depth in the trench of two feet or more, if the soil permit, of well-mixed mould. For this purpose, let good compost or rich garden mould (of which I saw abundance near the spot) be intimately mixed, by twice or three times turning, with the better parts of the contents of the trench, adding about a third part of good well-rotted dung, so as that a proper chemical action