6587. Sowing. Most of the sorts may be sown immediately after being gathered, in which case they will be more certain of germinating; and a number of elms, poplars, and willows will come up the same autumn. But as protection during winter will, in that case, become requisite, the better way, in general, is to defer sowing till March or April; when all the sorts may be sown in light rich earth, rather moist, and covered not more than half an inch. The principal tree of this class is the broadleaved elm, which, when intended for two-year seedlings (in most cases the preferable age for transplanting), should be sown to rise at least two inches apart, as the plants grow with great vigour even the first year.

6538. Their transplanting and future culture are the same as directed for berried stones, keys, &c.

SECT. VII. Culture common to all the Classes of Tree-Seeds.

6539. Insects and vermin. various descriptions of verinin.

917

New-sown seeds of most kinds are greedily devoured by Mice attack "acorns, sweet chestnuts, hazel-nuts, walnuts, and holly-seeds. They not only eat them on the spot, but they carry to their retreats great numbers of the seeds of which they are most fond. The cheapest, and perhaps the most effectual trap for their destruction, is the well known, but neglected, fourth figure trap. (fig. 917.) A very effective mouse trap is formed by burying an empty flower-pot with the bottom uppermost, and the hole covered with a handful of straw, as shown in fig. 918. (See Gard. Mag., vol. ii. p. 278.) Another plan is to sink bell glasses filled half full of water, with a little oatmeal strewed over the water, and a little also on the earth outside of the bell glass; covering the whole with some loose

straw to prevent evaporation in summer, and freezing in winter. (Ibid., vol. vii. p. 593.) The new-sown haws and mountain ash berries are a prey to the chaffinches, green linnets, and other birds. If the quantity sown be not great, the beds may be hooped over and covered with small-meshed nets. But if a great breadth of ground be sown, it must be constantly watched after sowing. If the watching be vigilantly attended to, for a few days immediately after sowing, the seed will not need much more attention till they begin to break the ground; at which period the watching should be closely and regularly continued. As they are always the strongest and best-ripened seeds which rise first, it is therefore of much importance to prevent these from being picked up." (Plant. Kal., p. 250.) In May the pines and firs will begin to pierce the ground with the husks of the seeds still on their tops, and then watching the birds becomes of the utmost importance; not one ought to be allowed to light on the beds; to prevent which will require unremitting attention from break of day till sunset, for five or six weeks, till the plants are all up, and have thrown off their husks. After the nuts, mast, and haws have come up, they are no longer in danger from mice, or birds, but they may be attacked by snails, and grubs of beetles and cockchafers at their roots. These may be captured and destroyed by placing slices of potatoes or turnips near the plants, either above or beneath the earth, according to the nature of the vermin: examining the bait every morning, and replacing it so long as appears necessary.

6540. Weeds. Before the tree-seeds come up, a crop of weeds will probably have made their appearance: these must be removed when young, otherwise drawing out their roots will materially disturb the vege tating seeds.

6541. Stirring the soil. "It not unfrequently happens, that the land in which fir and larch seeds have been sown, becomes battered by heavy rains. This will certainly happen if rain fall immediately after sowing, before the surface become dry; but if it once be fully dried after sowing, and before the rain fall, it will seldom or never batter. Suppose, however, the seed-beds are battered, so that the tender seeds cannot rise with freedom, the best way to relieve them is to draw over them a wooden roller, stuck over with lath-nails at half an inch distance, and driven in so as to remain half an inch beyond the wood of the roller. The roller should not be more than thirty inches long and not more than thirty pounds weight. By drawing this roller along the one side of the battered bed, while walking in the alley, and returning with it over the other, an ordinary-sized bed will be completely relieved. Some people rake their battered beds, in order to enable the seeds to rise. This is a most dangerous and destructive method of relieving vegetating plants. From their tender state, the smallest twist breaks them over, and consequently destroys them. We have experienced much advantage from using the light-armed roller, here recommended. It is, however, much better when no such are required. The surest way to guard against the need of such means, is to work the land when it is in a proper condition, and to sow the seeds in such weather as that the surface after sowing will be fully dry before rain come on. There is no dispensing with this precaution, when it is wished to secure an equal and good crop of seedlings." (Plant. Kal., p. 367.)

6542. Watering and shading. In June severe droughts very often set in, and these are very prejudicial to small seeds, especially those of the resinous tribe, when rising through the soil. At this time watering and shading may be applied with great advantage, provided the former is accompanied by the latter, and daily attended to from the time it is commenced till rain falls. The best mode of shading is by the wattled hurdle. By the end of July the seedling plants of most sorts will be out of danger, and, except a few of the tender sorts specified as requiring protection in winter, or by hand-giass or cold-frame, will require no other care but weeding till fit to be transplanted.

SECT. VIII. Propagating Trees by Layers, Cuttings, Suckers, Grafting, &c. 6543. Layering is, next to rearing from seeds, the most general mode of propagating hardy trees and shrubs.

6544. The more common species of forest trees to which this mode is applicable are, the Acer platanöides, Pseudo-Plátanus, tatáricum, dasycárpum, O'palus, and other species; Negundo fraxinifolia; Bétula lénta, populifòlia, and rùbra; Fagus ferruginea; Plátanus occidentalis and orientalis; Populus græ ca, monilifera, and canéscens; Tilia alba, americàna, europæe'a, and pubéscens; and Ulmus campéstris, nemoralis, suberòsa; and fastigiata, horizontális, péndula, variegata, and other nursery varieties. Some of these, as the poplars and planes, are also propagated by cuttings; but layers make the strongest plants. Whenever seeds can be procured, however, it is best to propagate in that way, as likely to produce the largest trees. The other trees propagated by layers, and also all the shrubs so propagated, will be found in our Hortus Britannicus, and the more common of them in the Arboricultural Catalogue which forms the following chapter. The situations and distances for planting stools in the nursery have been already mentioned; and, as there is nothing peculiar in the operation of layering timber trees or shrubs, we have merely to refer to the general directions as to layers and stools. The young or preceding year's shoots of all the sorts above enumerated, if layered in autuinn or winter, will be fit for being detached and planted in nursery lines by that time twelvemonth. They should be transplanted into well comminuted soil, suitable, as far as practicable, to the nature of each; and the distances should be regulated by the size of the layers and the time they are to be nursed. For ordinary purposes layers need not be nursed more than two years; but for single trees and ornamental plantations, they should be several times removed, and close pruned, till they have attained six or eight feet in height. Evergreen trees and shrubs, as being more tender than the others, should be layered in March and April, and from August to October. Some sorts root most freely when the wood is in a succulent state; and of such the current year's shoots are laid about midsummer. This is practised with Stuartia, d'rbutus, Andrómeda, Kálmia, Azalea, Magnòlia, Alatérnus, Phillyrea, Laurus nóbilis and Sassafras, Xantho xylum, Cydonia japónica, &c. The same practice is adopted with other free-growing aorts that it is wished to multiply as rapidly as possible; as the Rosa, Hibiscus, Lonicera, Caprifolium, Aristotèlia, Méspilus, &c. Layers of the last sorts made during summer from the same year's shoots, will be fit to detach by the winter, or the following spring; of the other sorts seldom sooner than the second August, or autumn; but even then a season is gained, as the layers of those plants made in autumn, generally require to remain two years before they have made sufficient roots. The layers of all evergreens should be removed at the proper seasons for pruning, laying, or transplanting that tribe; that is, April and May, and in August and September.

6545. By cuttings is the next general mode of propagating trees and shrubs, and the common forest trees generally so multiplied are as follows:- Platanus occidentalis and orientalis; Pópulus angulata, balsamifera, dilatata, græ'ca, monilifera, nigra, péndula, and trépida; Salix, all the tree species; and Sambucus nigra. These are also propagated by layers, and a few of them by seeds; which last, it should never be forgotten, is by far the best mode where timber trees is the object. The numerous tribe of shrubs propagated by cuttings will be found in the Hortus Britannicus, already referred to.

6546. The manner of forming and planting cuttings has been already described. The season for deciduous and evergreen woody plants are the same as for layering; and as in the latter mode of propagation, so in multiplying by cuttings, some sorts succeed best when the current year's wood is taken at midsum mer; as for example, Laúrus æstivalis, Benzoin, and Sassafras; Bignonia, Euphorbia, Phlomis, Rosa, Santolina, &c. Cuttings of some of these sorts, made of year-old wood in spring or autumn, require to stand two seasons before they have made sufficient roots to admit of their removal; by midsummer cuttings one year is gained. The same practice may be applied to deciduous sorts; but the plants produced are not so strong as by cuttings of the ripened wood. All cuttings require to be planted in a shady situ ation, and sandy soil, dry at bottom; but to be kept somewhat moist by occasional watering in dry weather: their lengths are generally made in proportion to the length of the year-old wood, but seldom exceeding six or eight inches. The shoots of some sorts, as poplar, willow, honeysuckle, &c. are divided into several cuttings of this length. An inch of the former year's wood is often preserved in autumnmade cuttings, but this is not essential; more important points are, making a smooth horizontal section at a bud, and, in planting, pressing the earth very firmly to the lower extremity of the cutting. Midsummer cuttings should, in almost all cases, be covered with hand or bell glasses. The alder, most willows, the Lombardy and some other poplars, will grow from cuttings or truncheons of several feet long, and of several inches in diameter. "This method is occasionally adopted, when it is requisite to form expeditiously some rough plantation, to serve as a hedge or screen along an outward boundary. Cuttings for this purpose may consist of long slender rods of one or two years' growth, or as well of large truncheons or stakes from three to six feet in length. Further, the willow, in particular, will increase from large pole-cuttings of from six to ten feet, planted out at once to form either pollard-stems, or be trained into full standards." (Abercrombie.)

6547. Cuttings of the roots. Many trees and shrubs may be thus propagated. Among these, are almost all the species of Prùnus, Pyrus, Malus, Crataegus, Méspilus, Ulmus, Pópulus, &c. Rhús, Ailántus, Corària, Rosa, Spiræ'a, and many other genera, may in part be so propagated. Excellent hawthorn hedges are sometimes produced from cuttings of the roots of an old hedge; in general, however, the cuttings of roots should be taken from young trees rather than old. They should be cut into lengths of from six inches to a foot, planted with that end of the root uppermost which was next to the trunk of the tree previous to removal, made firm, and the upper section covered with from half an inch to an inch of soil.

6548. The seasons for transplanting struck cuttings into nursery lines are those already mentioned as the most fit for moving deciduous and evergreen trees, originated by other modes. (6541.)

6549. By suckers. A few common trees, and a number of shrubs, are propagated by suckers. The timber trees are, the Ailántus glandulosa, Robínia Pseùd-Acacia; Populus canéscens, álba, and trémula; and U'lmus campestris. Of hedge plants, the common sloe and other wild plums, crabs, and pears, are, or may be, so propagated. Various shrubs are propagated by suckers. Suckers make better trees than plants raised from cuttings, and also very good hedge plants. To induce a tree to send up suckers, the horizontal roots may be laid bare, notched in different places, and the earth mixed with sand and replaced; a powerful co-operative would be to cut the tree over by the surface, by which means all the sap would be employed in root-shoots. At the end of one, but sometimes not till the end of the second season, the suckers will be fit to slip off, or to separate with the knife a part of the parent root attached; they may then be pruned as required, and planted in nursery lines. In raising plum stocks, it is a common practice to lay down all the shoots of the stools in winter, quite flat, and to cover them wholly over with an inch of soil. The following summer every bud produces a shoot, or sucker, which by the succeeding autumn is found sufficiently well furnished with roots to admit of removal. Rhús Cótinus may be thus multiplied.

6550. Grafting, budding, and inarching, are modes applicable to a few hardy trees and shrubs. The common forest trees are, the 0 rnus americana; Pópulus cándicans, heterophylla, and lævigata; Quércus Lucombeàna, and Ulmus campestris and suberòsa. These, and the ornamental trees and shrubs so propagated, are worked on stocks of the more hardy species of the same, or of the next allied genus; and, probably, make as durable plants for timber trees as layers; by which mode the above enumerated sorts are also propagated. The stocks should be at least one year established, previously either to grafting 4 E

or inarching; the operation for deciduous sorts is performed in spring at the movement of the sap. Ever. greens are almost always inarched either in April, or May, or August. Budding is performed in June and July, and is chiefly used in propagating the rose. Some inarched sorts require two seasons before the scion can be detached from the parent plant.

6551. General culture and management of a private nursery. There is nothing material to be advanced on this head, but what has been already mentioned in this chapter, or in treating of the general management of the kitchen-garden. The first grand point is so to arrange the rotation of crops, that a crop of culinary vegetables shall intervene between every crop of trees, where that crop remains on the same soil two or more years; and between every two or three crops, where the crop of trees is taken up annually, or every second year. The next thing is changing the surface of the soil, as in horticulture, weeding, stirring the surface, watering, shading, pruning, training, staking, and protecting. The important points of management are to procure the proper quantities of seeds or stools requisite to produce the quantity of trees to be annually furnished; to proportion the number of plants taken up daily to the number replanted in the nursery or forest the same day, and to attend to general order and neatness.

CHAP. IX.

Arboricultural Catalogue.

6552. In our arboricultural catalogue we mean to enumerate, and shortly describe, the principal timber trees, which may be cultivated with advantage as such, in the climate of Britain, and also the most useful plants for hedges. We shall arrange the whole as resinous, hard-wooded, and soft-wooded trees; including in each section the hedge plants belonging to it, and in the last, the willows proper for osier plantations; the general culture of the trees contained in each of these sections has been given in chapters III. IV. VII. and VIII.; and the soil and mode of propagation of each individual species, together with a descriptive enumeration of all the species hitherto introduced into Britain, will be found in our Hortus Britannicus.

SECT. I. Resinous or Coniferous Trees.

6553. The coniferous trees in common cultivation in Britain are comprised in the three tribes composing the natural order Coniferæ: viz., Abiétina, Cupréssina, and Táxina. The four genera of the Abiétinæ, or pine and fir tribe, which are most generally planted in Britain, are Pinus, Abies, Larix, and Cèdrus. The Cupressus, Juniperus, Thuja, Schubertia, and Taxus, are the principal trees belonging to the other tribes; but as they, with the exception of Taxus, may be considered on the whole more as ornamental than forest trees, we deem it unnecessary here to add any thing to what our readers will find in our Hortus Britannicus. Taxus will be noticed with more propriety under the succeeding section.

6554. Of the genera composing the Ahietine, the pines are distinguished by fasciculated leaves in different sheaths, but proceeding from the same sheathing-base; the firs by solitary leaves; the larches by fasciculated leaves from solitary sheaths; and the cedars by distichous and spreading leaves. The branches of the whole of the Abiétina are frondose or spreading, and caducous: those of the pine spread the least; those of the firs are thin and much spread, and are peculiarly frondlike: those of the larches rather droop; and those of the cedars are characterised by straight horizontal extension.

6555. The Wild or Scotch Pine, erroneously denominated Scotch fir, is the Pinus sylvestris L. (Lam. Pin. 1. t. 1.) Pin, Fr.; Keifer or Führe, Ger.; Pijnboom, Dutch; and Pino, Ital. (fig. 919. a) It is an evergreen sub-conical tree; the leaves inclining to dark blue or grey shorter and broader than those of the pinaster (b); it is common in most parts of Europe,

919

The

particularly the northern countries, and is the only species of the genus indigenous to Britain, being a native of Scotland, and naturalised in England and Wales. Under favourable circumstances it attains the height of eighty feet: it flowers in May, and the cones are fit to gather in December of the following year. The finest pine woods in Britain are at Invercauld in Inverness-shire, and Gordon Castle in Aberdeenshire. 6556. Use. The timber of this tree is the red or yellow deal of the north of Europe, and is the most durable and valuable of any of the genus, unless we except the common larch. The universality of its application is known to every one. Highland pine, Sang states to be not inferior to any imported, either in cleanness or durability, when it has been grown on a proper soil, and to a sufficient age. "But the planted Low. land pine," he adds, " is seldom applied to offices higher than that of roofing sheds or huts, lining of carts, lathing, or making of packing-boxes; while the natural or self-sown is fit for the finest purposes." Mathew says that the best Scotch pine he has ever seen was grown on the alluvial soil of the Carse of Gowrie. (Naval Timber, &c., p. 303.) According to Reid, an eminent Aberdeen nurseryman, the best Scotch pine timber is always found growing on a hazel loam. (Gard. Mag., vol. iv. p. 315.) Pontey considers the English-grown Scotch pine, if

properly pruned, and grown to a sufficient age, as likely to equal that of foreign growth. Main says that "the Scotch pine, when allowed to stand till it has attained a great age, produces as fine yellow deal as any imported;" and he instances "two cut down on the estate of Chalfont, Bucks, in 1800, which had been growing at least 200 years. These trees contained about 13 load of clear timber each, and were declared by every carpenter who saw them to be most excellent yellow deal." The tree is of great value as a nurse-plant; being, next to the common birch and mountain ash, or mountain sorb (Pyrus Aria), the most hardy timber tree. Among its minor uses we shall only mention the production of tar by incision.

6557. Varieties. Of these several have been noticed by botanists. According to Sang, the variety commonly cultivated is worth the trouble. "The P. sylvestris var. montàna,"

lastays, is the variety which yields the red wood: even

young trees of this sort are said to become red in their wood, and full of resin, very soon. The late botanist, Mr. Don, of Forfar, exhibited specimens of cones of each variety to the Highland Society of Scotland, and likewise to the Caledonian Horticultural Society. The variety preferred by Don is distinguished by the disposition of its branches, which are remarkable for their horizontal direction, and for a tendency to bend downwards close to the trunk. The leaves are broader and shorter than in the common kind, and are distinguishable at a distance by their much lighter and beautiful glaucous appearance. The bark of the trunk is smoother than in the common kind. The cones are thicker, and not so much pointed. The plant is more hardy than the common sort, grows freely in almost any soil or situation, and quickly arrives at a considerable size." Sang says, he has seen trees of tl is variety at Caristoun and Brechin Castle: and it is much to be wished that he, or some other competent nurseryman in that quarter, would collect the seeds, and propagate it extensively. Thouin (Notes sur la Culture de Pins, 8vo. 1819) mentions a variety, which he calls P. syl. var. Pin de Riga, as affording the best timber. Vilmorin, who has paid great attention to this subject, considers the Pin de Hagenau a very superior variety, and procures annual supplies of its seeds. (Gard. Mag., vol. v. p. 67.)

6558. Soil and native site. This tree is naturally the inhabitant of mountainous districts, and of rocky, gravelly, or poor sandy soils, where its timber becomes most valuable and durable. On the sides of mountains, in dells and hollows, among stones and rocks, beside rapid rivulets or mountain torrents, it is found in high perfection; and, if it stand single, it is of great beauty. In many parts of the Scottish Highlands, where the soils are extremely various, and much mixed, the Scotch pine has arrived at a good size, and often attained remarkable dimensions. In any kind of soil, from a sandy to a clay, provided the substratum be rubble or rock, it will grow and flourish; but in wet tilly soils, it ought never to be planted; because, whenever the roots have exhausted the turf or upper soil, and begin to perforate the subsoil, the tree languishes and dies." (Plant. Kal. p. 65.)

6564. The Cembra Pine, or Aphernousli Pine, or Siberian Cedar (Pinus Cémbra L.) (fig. 164.), is a native of Switzerland and also of Siberia, though it is now rarely found wild in the former country. The general form of the tree is conical; and in Switzerland it is of very slow growth, usually not rising more than a span in height during six years. The timber has a most agreeable perfume, and is much used for wainscoting, as well as for domestic utensils. Its growth in Britain is from two to six inches in length in a year; and, with a view to the use of its timber in cabinet-work, as well as to the beauty of the tree in scenery, it deserves to be introduced in all extensive plantations.

6565. The Weymouth or New England pine (P. Strolus) (Lam. Pin. 31. t. 22.) (fig. 993.) forms the connecting link between the pine and larch tribe. It is one of the tallest of the genus, attaining in America the height of 100 feet and up

1155

6566. A number of other species are enumerated in our Hortus Britannicus; all of which are of interest in a botanical and picturesque point of view, and therefore are most desirable for furnishing a pinetum; though, for profitable planting, none are equal to the Corsican and the Scotch pine.

6567. The Norway Fir, or Common Spruce Fir (A'bies excelsa Poir., P. Abies L. (Lam. Pin. 75. t. 25.); Sapin Epicca, Fr.; Fichte, or Tanne, Ger. Sparreboom, Dutch; Abiele, Ital.) is one of the tallest of European trees, attaining from 100 to and throwing out its spreading frond-like branches so as to 150 feet in height, with a very straight but not thick trunk, form an elegant narrow cone of vivid green. It is a native of the north of Europe and is particularly abundant, as the name imports, in Norway: its timber being the white deal received from that country and the Baltic; and the smaller trees forming the well known Norway spars of European timber merchants, so much in use as masts for small craft, and as scaffolding poles by builders. it is supposed to have been introduced about 1548, and has been, and still is, more cultivated than any species of the Abiétine, except the com mon pine and the larch.

6568. Use. The timber is inferior to that of the common pine in durability and bulk; and, being often knotty, is not pro portionably strong for horizontal bearings with that timber. White Norway deal, however, is used for a great variety of purposes in building; and the entire trees are more prized than any other for masts for small craft, for spars both for marine purposes and on land. What constitutes the value of this fir is, that its timber is equally durable at any age, like that of the larch; and what renders it peculiarly adapted for masts, spars, scaffolding, poles, &c. is its habit of almost in every case, whether standing single or detached, growing per fectly erect and straight. The tree may be cut for rods, stakes, and scythe or other implement handles, when the trunk at the base is not more than two inches in diameter,

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