planted by thousands and millions; and, what is very extraordinary, the most barren land is converted into fine pasturage by the process. The larch succeeds best on poor land, while the annual fall of its leaves soon gives rise to a fine natural grass that is highly valuable for grazing. Land has been let at a yearly rent of from ten shillings to three pounds the acre, that, before the planting of the larch, was not worth so many pence. It is calculated that in the next age the Highlands of Scotland alone will be able to furnish the whole commerce of Britain with timber for its shipping. The spirit for planting continues to the present time. In 1820, the London Society for the Promotion of the Arts presented a gold medal to one individual, for planting nearly two millions of forest-trees, one half of which were larch. Most assuredly, those individuals who have thus enriched their country deserve well of posterity.
The celebrated Coke, of Norfolk, has been a successful planter of forest-trees. It is said that, soon after this gentleman came into possession of his estate, the lease of a certain parcel of land expired. This land (eleven thousand acres) had been let at a yearly rent of three shillings per acre; but this the lessee thought too much, and offered only two shillings; to which Coke replied, "No, I will sooner turn it into a hunting-ground;" and he immediately set to planting it with oak, larch, and the Spanish chestnut. In a few years, the annual thinnings alone yielded him more than the former rental. At the time of his marriage, this magnificent wood-lot was valued at ₤220,000.
The planting of trees is by no means such a hopeless or heartless affair as some people imagine. A short time since, I called upon an aged gentleman[1] of this county, and was politely invited to see his trees. As we passed beneath a noble range of plane-trees, whose bending boughs seemed to do homage to their planter, my friend informed me that the trees I was then admiring, some of which were sixty or seventy feet high, and five or six feet in circumference, were a fine seed between his thumb and finger, after he was five
- ↑ Dr. Kilham, of Wenham.
