After this poplar, the best is the white, which is common on the banks of the Mersey and in Cheshire; and to these may be added the asp, a species of poplar hardly worth cultivation, but useful for making arrows, owing to the lightness of its wood, which disqualifies it for more imporThe best time for setting cuttings is

tant uses. October.

THE

HUNTINGDON WILLOW.

As the Italian poplar among its own tribe claims a merited pre-eminence, so the Huntingdon is esteemed the most of the willow kind. It affects the same situation, nearly, as the poplar, but will, perhaps, bear even wetter ground. There are thirty kinds of willow, mostly of the aquatic tribe, being generally of a most prosperous growth in watery situations. They will, however, grow freely in any common soil and exposure, but the strongest and fastest in low moist land, on the banks of rivers, and along the sides of watery ditches; which places frequently lying waste, may be employed to good advantage in plantations of willows for different purposes. In the low country, about Warrington, they may be observed to flourish exceedingly. The wood of the Huntingdon willow, though useful, and employed for the same purposes as the Italian poplar, is somewhat

inferior to it, being more liable to decay. As soon as this tree is perceived to have lost its wonted vigour at its head, that moment the axe should be resorted to; for the heart decaying first, the tree becomes worthless before the trunk indicates the mischief. The lightness of its foliage gives the willow a claim to ornamental plantations. Its propagation may best take place from the same means as used for the poplar, and it is astonishing to observe to what a magnitude it attains, with very partial thinnings of the original plantation Thirty years will bring this tree to perfection. The weeping willow is more picturesque than useful. The golden or yellow, the purple, the crack, and Babylonian willows conduce more to ornament than utility-but, perhaps, the osier is as profitable as any willow, when planted upon moist situations, upon the banks of rivers, frequently overflowed, or wherever temporary inundation can be produced. They will be best raised from cuttings of two years old wood, about fifteen inches long, ten inches of which to be thrust into the ground in rows, two feet distance, and eighteen inches from each other. It will be highly proper to keep the weeds down, especially the first year. The osiers must

continue growing for three years, when they must be fallen to the first head; this crop will sell well to the hurdle-maker, and there will be the number of proper stools left to produce an annual crop of twigs, which will be worth many pounds per acre, for the basket-maker, for cotton skips, and, indeed, all kinds of wicker-work. In short, it is thought no plantation yields equal profit to the osier, properly cultivated.

THE

SPANISH CHESNUT.

Pars autem posito surgunt de semine: ut altæ castanæ.

VIRGIL.

THIS tree, which arrives in our English forests to great magnitude and dignity, is, as the name implies, indigenous to Spain. It mingles well with the oak, affecting a similar soil and situation. Some, indeed, assert, that the chesnut owns England for its parent soil, and the timber of this tree, almost always found in the old houses in London, corroborate the idea; but if this is really the case, it is surprizing how it should be, as it at present is, almost exterminated in this country; perhaps the brittleness of its wood, and its decaying at the heart, has occasioned less encouragement to be given to it. However, it certainly reaches a great stature here, as the woods near Beachworth-castle, in Surrey, and the banks of the Tamer, in Cornwall, will demonstrate. At Tortworth, in Glou