to preserve any tender rootlets which may have been formed at or near the extremity of the old roots.

The principal advantage of following this practice (which I know from experience to be a good one) must therefore arise from checking the plant in its growth before it is taken up. The same practice is adopted in removing to pots or tubs plants which grow in a conservatory. In this case the plants are generally in a much more vigorous state than those in the open air; and, therefore, when they are of any considerable size, it often happens that it is necessary to cut the roots twice before removal, the second cutting being nearer the stem than the first. By this means, the plants are brought from a vigorous to a more stunted state of growth, and may be removed with perfect safety without even dropping a leaf, although not a young root formed at or near the extremity of the cut roots can be preserved. If such plants, when in a state of vigour, be taken up at once, without any previous preparation of their roots, it is scarcely possible to effect the removal without losing a great part of the young shoots, and probably most of the leaves.

I shall take another example to show the advantage of checking plants gradually, and stunting their growth previous to removal. We know that certain plants which grow naturally in the earth may, if gradually removed from it, be suspended in the air, where they will live for years, with no other nourishment than that which they derive from the absorption of water sprinkled on their surface. In this situation they form no new roots, and those which they had originally, after two or three years, assume the appearance of leafless branches. Nevertheless, if these plants be again placed in the earth, they will soon acquire as great vigour as ever; and this alternation may with caution be many times repeated. But if we suddenly, while the plant is in a state of vigorous growth, deprive its roots of earth, we very speedily kill it.

Were it necessary, other facts might be adduced to prove that at least one great advantage of cutting the roots of large trees previous to removal is derived from the check thus given, and, by consequence, that every measure taken to promote that vigour previous to removal must be injurious. These examples would

show, that some overvalue the importance of preserving the young roots, made at the cut extremities of the old. It has been recommended to cut these entirely away at the period of transplanting, from an apprehension that, as they cannot survive the injuries which they must necessarily sustain, their decay may be injurious to the tree in its subsequent growth. I cannot go quite so far as this; but if I have been able to show that their value is overrated, it would follow that the operation of transplanting large trees may be cheapened by disregarding the roots formed in this situation.

ROYAL BOTANIC GARDEN, EDINBURGH, 24th December 1830.

REMARKS ON CERTAIN STRICTURES ON HIS TREATISE ON PLANTING. By Mr CRUICKSHANK.

To the Editor of the Quarterly Journal of Agriculture. You will doubtless recollect having reviewed, in your ninth Number, a treatise, entitled "The Practical Planter, containing Directions for the Planting of Waste Land, and the Management of Wood; with a New Method of rearing the Oak." The same work (of which you will recognise the author's name in the signature of this letter), has subsequently had its merits examined by Mr Loudon, in the twenty-seventh Number of his "Gardener's Magazine." Permit me, through the medium of your Journal, to lay before your readers some observations on that gentleman's criticism. If your object be, as it assuredly is, to encourage the useful arts, your wish must be to render justice to those who cultivate them. While I trust, therefore, that you will not refuse me the privilege of defending myself against an unjust attack, I entertain the hope that my remarks may prove of interest to some of your readers, as showing the nature and tendency of what, amongst a certain class of writers, is called reviewing.

In his notice of the Practical Planter, Mr Loudon has accused me of having, in that work, made false pretensions to origi

nality, as well as of misrepresenting certain passages in his Encyclopædia of Gardening. To the reasoning by which he endeavours to substantiate these two charges, I shall chiefly confine my attention, glancing, however, if space permit, at a few more of his allegations.

The principal ground on which Mr Loudon endeavours to convict me of putting in false claims to originality, is, that I have applied the epithet "New" to my mode of cultivating the oak. "What Mr Cruickshank calls a new method of rearing the oak," says he, "is planting the acorns in plantations of pines, firs, or other trees, of three or four years' growth, in order that they may be sheltered during their infancy,—a very excellent mode, and particularly well adapted for the north of Scotland; but which, as it has been long practised at Walbeck in Nottinghamshire, and in the New Forest in Hampshire, is at least not new in England."

This, Sir, is the argument by which Mr Loudon proves that my system of culture for the oak is not new on the other side of the Tweed. Our critic, however, has in this instance had recourse to a little sophistry. What he represents here as my method, is, in fact, but a part of it. He has taken the liberty to remodel and divest it of its peculiarities, in order to show that its pretensions to novelty are unfounded. Allowing me a similar freedom, I could prove most conclusively, that the agriculture of Scotland, at the present day, is conducted on exactly the same principles as it was a hundred years ago. Leaving out of view the innovations that have taken place during a century in the rotation of crops,-taking no notice of the introduction of the turnip-husbandry,-and passing over in silence other trifling improvements of a similar kind,-would it not be plain, that our farmers now cultivate the earth in precisely the same style as their great-grandfathers did, because, in common with their venerable ancestors, they make use of ploughs, harrows, and dungforks, and, like them too, sow oats, barley, and wheat? To plant acorns in the mode described by Mr Loudon, is indeed a feature of my system, but it is only a single feature; and it is just as absurd to identify the Walbeck method and it, because they happen to agree in this solitary characteristic, as it would be to pretend that the Encyclopædia of

Gardening and that of Agriculture are one and the same work, because they are both ponderous volumes, and respectively crammed with the pillaged sentiments of a hundred different authors.

I would put the following questions to Mr Loudon. Do the people at Walbeck and the New Forest plant the nurses for their oaks in the way I recommend? Does their mode of preparing the ground for the reception of the acorns coincide with mine? Is lime used in the operation, and in the manner and quantity I specify? Is their management of the trees, after planting, agreeable to the maxims I have laid down? And, finally, Do they conduct all these processes at an expense in accordance with the estimate I have given? If Mr Loudon can, consistently with truth, answer all these questions in the affirmative, then the originality of my mode of culture, in so far as respects England, falls to the ground. But that gentleman knows well he cannot do this. Let, then, the reader judge for himself regarding the justice of my claims, and the fairness and accuracy of Mr Loudon's criticisms.

Not satisfied with attempting to dash the pretensions of my New Method to novelty in England, the ingenious critic next proceeds to show, first, "That there is nothing new among Scots authors in the proposal to raise oak woods from the acorn;" and, secondly, "That there is nothing new in Scots practice" in actually doing so. Here he buckles on his armour to fight a shadow; for all that he contends for I grant, as may be seen at page 209 of the Practical Planter. The use of acorns instead of plants from the nursery, is, I must again repeat, but a single feature of my plan; and to represent this one trait as the whole system, is just about as reasonable as it would be to assert, that the human body is composed wholly of great toe, or that a horse has nothing about him corporeal besides his tail. Yet it is but in this solitary circumstance that my method of rearing the oak, and that proposed or practised by others, as an improvement on the general mode of Scottish culture, have the least appearance of affinity. Were it worth while, it could easily be shown, that even the bare planting of acorns is far from being so generally practised in Scotland up to the present day, as Mr Loudon would convince his

readers; and that it was extremely little known at a period so recent as when Dr Yule wrote on arboriculture, is plain to a demonstration; else what could have moved that gentleman to recommend it as a principle which, though good, was little understood or acted upon? Letting this, however, pass as a matter in which I am not concerned, I may say to Mr Loudon, in reference to one of the testimonies which he produces against me, "Out of thine own mouth will I condemn thee."

In order to prove that my system was well known in Scotch practice long before the Practical Planter made its appearance, Mr Loudon refers his readers to his Encyclopædia of Gardening, Art. 6828. Now, on referring to this authoritative passage, what does it turn out to be? An account of Scotch practice, proving clearly the said practice and the Practical Planter's method of rearing the oak to coincide? By no means. The passage turns out to be, not a description of any practice whatever -not a system of culture relating specially to the oak, but a confused discussion, a parcel of contradictory sentiments, copied from near half a score of different writers concerning the question, Whether trees in general ought to be sown or planted? In this grave debate, one author says one thing-another, something else,—and several appear to doubt what it may be proper for them to say. The best of all is, that Nicol, from whom "E. D. G.," the coadjutor of Mr Loudon, in writing the review of my work, accuses me of having stolen my system of oak culture, is here represented as an advocate for planting in preference to sowing! Another authority, which is triumphantly quoted against me, is the General Report of Scotland, vol. ii. p. 269, which tells us, as quoted in the Encyclopædia of Gardening, that there are some rare instances in Scotland of "promising oak plantations, from oaks dibbled into soil altogether unimproved.” What resemblance Mr Loudon saw here to my system, I am utterly at a loss to conjecture. Did he review my book without reading it, or did he write under the conviction that the unfortunate volume which he thus misrepresents never had been, and never would be, opened by a single individual who reads his Magazine? Yet this last reference is not much farther out of the way, than the assertion that the system of Dr Yule and Mr Sang is coincident with mine. They recommend ploughing or