must avoid the temptation, which all writers on plantations, our friends Pontey and Mr Monteath not excepted, are disposed to yield to, where there is such an opportunity for fine description. We remember Lord Byron's reproof to Moore :— "Come, hang it, Tom, don't be poetical." So we sheathe our eloquence, and resume the humble unadorned tone of rural admonition.

We may, however, just hint to planters, as unpoetical as ourselves, that in achieving such a task as we have proposed to them, nature will, in spite of them, realize, in many places, the wishes breathed by improvers of a different description. In the sort of ground which we have described, it happens invariably that particular places are found where the natural wood, in spite of all the causes which combine to destroy it, has used effective efforts to preserve its existence in the various forms of scattered and stunted trees, tangled and briery copsewood, and small shoots of underwood, which, kept down by the continual browsing of the cattle, affords only twigs, the existence of which is scarcely manifest among the grass. In all these cases, the remains of natural wood arising rapidly, when protected by enclosures against the intrusion of cattle volunteer their services to the planter. These are often so important, that, by properly trimming the old wood, the introduction of new plants may, in many cases, be altogether dispensed with. In others the small twigs, invisible when the ground was planted, come up afterwards as underwood, and serve for the purpose of harbouring game or form

ing thickets. Nay, in some, this natural growth will be found" something between a hinderance and a help," encumbering, and sometimes altogether overpowering and superseding the artificial planting. The trees which thus voluntarily present themselves, as the natural tenants of the soil, are oak, hazel, mountain-ash, thorns of different kinds, hackberry (called bird-cherry), holly, &c., in the dry places; and in those which incline to be moist, the alder and willow. The forester may look with almost an absolute certainty for the arrival of these volunteer supplies, if he plants a space of two or three hundred acres. They serve to beautify the operations of art, by adding the wild colouring and drapery of nature. According to the old school of planting, it was the business of the forester to destroy, upon such occasions, the natural productions of the soil, in order to protect the much more worthless plants with which he had himself stocked it. Thus, we know a large plantation, in which a natural oak copse was twice rooted out, in order to protect one of base Canadian firs; yet when the woods afterwards began to be managed with more taste and knowledge, the oaks still remained strong enough, despite these two attempts at extirpation, to supersede the intruders; and they constitute at this time the principal part of the existing wood.

We are now come to the distance to be observed betwixt the plants, on putting them into the ground. This is a subject on which different opinions are maintained; opinions which, however, we think have been unnecessarily placed in oppo

sition to each other :-the mode of planting closely, or putting in the trees at a greater distance, being each preferable or inferior to the other in relation to the situation of the plantation, and the purposes for which it is destined.

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And considering this most important point, with relation to the number of the principal trees designed to remain as the ultimate stock on the land, we must confess our opinion, that the number of hard-wood trees planted is generally much greater than is necessary. A common rule allots the space of six or seven feet betwixt each principal plant. This seems far too large an allowance, and adds greatly to the expense of planting, without producing any correspondent return. If planted so near each other, a great number of the hard-wood trees must be taken out as weedings, before they attain any marketable value; and, as they shoot again after they are cut down, they are apt to interfere with the growth of the trees which it is the object of the planter finally to cherish, unless the roots themselves are got rid of by the expensive operation of grubbing. If the hard-timber trees are planted at ten or twelve feet distance from each other, there will be room enough left for them to attain a foot in diameter before it is necessary to remove any of them. When planted at a smaller distance than the above, many must certainly be moved ere they have attained any value, while the operation, at the same time, gives to the proprietor the painful feeling attached to destroying a fine plant in its very bloom of promise. But this, like

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many other maxims concerning planting, is liable to be controlled by circumstances. In forming a plantation near a residence, it may be of great inportance to place the hard-wood plants at six or eight feet distance, especially if the soil or exposure be indifferent. This gives the planter, at the distance of ten or twelve years, a choice in selecting the particular trees which will best suit the situation, and the power at the same time of rendering the wood a complete screen, by cutting down the others for under-wood, the introduction of which beauty and utility alike recommend.

If

there are still thriving young trees, which it is necessary to remove, they are, in such a case, useful to the proprietor: he may plant them out as ornamental trees either upon his lawn; or, as we have ourselves practised, these outcasts of the plantation may be scattered about in the neighbouring pastures. If they are planted with a little care among such patches of furze as usually occur in sheep-ground, with some attention to shelter and soil, it is really wonderful how few of them fail, certainly not above one out of ten, even where no great attention is bestowed on the process, except by cleansing such sheltered spots for receiving the trees. Those that dwindle must be cut, even after standing a year; they will generally send up fine shoots upon the season following. Here, however, we are again straying from our immediate task; for profit and pleasure are so intimately united in this delightful pursuit, that it is frequently difficult to distinguish where their paths separate. Upon the whole,

however, it may be considered as unnecessary extravagance in a plantation of great extent, and calculated chiefly for profit, to place the principal or hard-wood trees nearer than twelve feet. Should one be found to fail, its place may be easily supplied by leaving a larch as a principal tree in its room, an exchange which ultimately leaves little ground for regret.

The quantity of nurses (which, according to our mode of planting, will be chiefly larches, intermingled with Scotch firs where exposure requires it) should seem also a relative question, to be decided by circumstances. If there is a favourable prospect for the sale of the weedings of the plantation at an early period, there can be no doubt of the truth of the old maxim-" Plant thick, and thin early." In this case the larches may be set within three and a half feet of each other generally over the plantation, leaving them somewhat more distant upon the places peculiarly sheltered, and placing them something closer upon exposed ridges, and in rows formed to interrupt the course of the prevailing winds.

If the planting thrives, the larches will, in the fifth or sixth year, require a thinning, the produce of which, in an inhabited country, will certainly be equal to the expense. The bark, for example, will produce from four to five pounds a-ton, or otherwise, in proportion to the value of oak bark, amounting usually to one half the value of that commodity. The peeled sticks, from an inch and a half to three inches diameter, find a ready demand. The smallest