cannot be too often repeated or too earnestly enforced, that it is by principles drawn from nature, and elucidated by, science, that any real progress can be made in an art like the one under discussion, where nature and science must unite in regulating the process, and art must follow in the track which they prescribe.

SECTION VII.

PREPARATION OF THE TREES FOR REMOVAL.

IT has been said above that the removal of large trees is applicable to two different objects, namely, single trees, or open dispositions of wood, and to close plantations ; which last consist of grove and underwood intermixed. Now, as the former much more frequently occur in practice than the latter, so transplanting may be generally said, as has been already noticed, to imply increased exposure.

By the wise economy of nature, it has been provided that trees in open situations, in order to thrive, must possess certain external conditions which have been designated the protecting properties. Therefore the principle of transplanting lies in adopting such subjects as possess those properties, wherever they can be found, and in communicating them to others in which they may be deficient. It is obvious that trees endued with the protecting properties or prerequisites require no preparation at all; and that those trees which possess them partially or inadequately require it precisely in the ratio or degree of that inadequate possession. Further, it is apparent, as these properties must be either protecting or non-protecting, or a modification of the one or the other, so the complete presence of the one class of properties necessarily implies the absence of the other class. But both may nevertheless exist at one and the same time in different parts of the same tree. For the purpose of removal, for example,

such a plant may possess fibrous roots and spreading branches, (two of the protecting properties which are generally concomitant,) yet it may be deficient in both bark and stem. In like manner it may have desirable stem and bark, (two properties, likewise, which usually go together,) and yet fail in branches and roots.

It is a great error to imagine with the early planters, and as is still done by many, that the business of preparation applies solely to roots. As well might it be imagined that the roots carry up the sap to the top; that they elaborate it in the leaves; that they transmit it to the stem and branches; and, in a word, that this single organ performs all the various functions which exist in a complicated system. When the ingenious Lord Fitzharding, as we learn from Evelyn, thought of cutting round the roots of trees in order to multiply their lateral fibres, it cannot be deemed surprising that he should have been unaware how small a part of the work of preparation he had effected by that invention. But it is much more extraordinary that, during the many years that my practice has been open to general inspection, should never occur to any one that its success did not depend merely on the roots, but must be governed by some general and fixed principles: for to this day, when the roots of trees are cut round, as is often done, they are said to be "fully prepared according to my method;" while the planter who so prepares them does not suspect that he is merely fulfilling one of four conditions which are pointed out by that method. But perhaps it was not supposed that a process seemingly so simple as transplanting appeared to be, in the hands of my workmen, required any principle at all to regulate it.

It has been stated in a foregoing section, that the perfect and internal development of woody plants is depen

dent on certain external conditions; and that, when those conditions are imperfectly supplied, this development cannot take place. It has been further observed, that the most perfect development in all cases appears manifest where the protecting properties are most fully displayed. If these things be true, it will follow that to prepare trees for removal only means to allow nature, if I may so speak, to do her own work and that we shall always best accomplish by clearing away those accidental obstacles and mechanical impediments which are sometimes thrown in her way, as they obstruct and misdirect the simple but efficient methods which she employs towards the accomplishment of one of the most beautiful as well as complicated of her processes. The difficulty lies in administering to nature discreetly; neither officiously directing her on the one hand, nor rudely controlling her on the other.

The main obstacle or impediment to the acquisition of the protecting properties in trees is shelter and closeness, or the want of a sufficient action of the atmosphere around them. Vegetable, like animal life, is dependent for its existence on the external conditions of food, air, water, and heat, while light is a condition more peculiar to plants. Where trees, as in unthinned plantations, press too closely on one another, the range which the roots require for their food is circumscribed. Wind being in a great degree excluded, and evaporation prevented, heat is by consequence generated in an undue degree. In the same way, light is nearly shut out from such plantations, except from the top, and a disproportioned elongation of the stem is occasioned by the efforts which each individual makes to gain the light. By these means the bark becomes thinner and more delicate, the roots more scanty, and the spray and branches more open and

sparing than when there is a greater action of the atmosphere and a freeer access of light. Thus, by the law of nature by which trees accommodate themselves to the circumstances in which they are placed, as the possession of the non-protecting properties does not constitute the most natural or most perfect state of trees, but is superinduced by circumstances, so that state must be improved by the alteration of such circumstances, and the possession of the opposite or protecting properties be substituted in its stead. The planter, therefore, in ordinary cases, if he act with judgment, has little more to do than to bring about a gradual, a salutary, and in the end a free exposure of trees to the elements, and their own native energies and plastic powers will do every thing else for themselves.

Having explained as distinctly as I can the true principle on which the preparation of trees should be made, I will now proceed to point out the practice. Subjects for removal may be prepared in two different ways, or more properly speaking, in two different classes, namely, as single trees, each independently of the other; or as masses, especially trained and disciplined for the purpose.

And first, as to single or individual trees. It has been already noticed that many trees stand in need of no preparation at all, but may immediately be taken up and removed to where they are wanted. If what has been said above, on the selection of subjects, be fully apprehended by the reader, he will have little difficulty in regulating his choice, and determining what subjects really possess the four essential prerequisites or protecting properties; because proper preparation and the possession of those properties may be considered as nearly convertible About every place, great or small, such subjects are always to be found in pretty open dispositions, in old

terms.