Old Hampshire Mapped
Cobbett's Hampshire
Transcription (88)woods
forestry
oak
fir
locust
hare
The same person (a very civil and intelligent man) that showed me the nursery, took me, in my way, back, through some plantations of oaks, which have been made amongst fir-trees. it was, indeed, a plantation of Scotch firs, about twelve years old, in rows, at six feet apart. Every third row of firs was left, and oaks were (about six years ago) planted instead of the firs that were grubbed up; and the winter shelter, that the oaks have received from the remaining firs, has made them grow very finely, though the land is poor. Other oaks planted in the open, twenty years ago, and in land deemed better, are not nearly so good. However, these oaks, between the firs, will take fifty or sixty good years to make them timber, and, until they be timber, they are of very little use; whereas, the same ground, planted with Locusts (and the hares of 'my lords' kept down), would, at this moment, have been worth fifty pounds an acre. ...
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