may be marked as they stand, in a moment; and that
once done, the difficulty is over. I have been the larger upon these two
remarks, because I find them so material, and yet so much neglected.

8. There are other rules concerning the situation of trees; the former
author commending the north-east-wind both for the flourishing of the
tree, and advantage of the timber; but to my observation in our
climates, where those sharp winds do rather flanker than blow fully
opposite upon our plantations, they thrive best; and there are as well
other circumstances to be considered, as they respect rivers and marshes
obnoxious to unwholsom and poysonous fogs, hills and seas, which expose
them to the weather; and those _silvifragi venti_, our cruel and tedious
western-winds; all which I leave to observation, because these accidents
do so universally govern, that it is not easie to determine farther than
that the timber is commonly better qualified which hath endur'd the
colder aspects without these prejudices. And hence it is that Seneca
observes, wood most expos'd to the winds to be the most strong and
solid, and that therefore _Chiron_ made _Achilles's_ spear of a
mountain-tree; and of those the best, which grow thin, not much
shelter'd from the north. Again, Theophrastus seems to have special
regard to places; exemplifying in many of Greece, which exceeded others
for good timber, as doubtless do our oaks in the Forest of Dean all
others of England: And much certainly there may reasonably be attributed
to these advantages for the growth of timber, and of almost all other
trees, as we daily see by their general improsperity, where the ground
is a hot gravel, and a loose earth: An oak, or elm in such a place shall
not in an hundred years, overtake one of fifty, planted in its proper
soil; though next to this, and (haply) before it, I prefer the good air.
But thus have they such vast junipers in Spain; and the ash in some
parts of the Levant (as of old near Troy) so excellent, as it was after
mistaken for cedar, so great was the difference; as now the Cantabrian,
or Spanish exceeds any we have elsewhere in Europe. And we shall
sometimes in our own country see woods within a little of each other,
and to all appearance, growing on the same soil, where oaks of twenty
years growth, or forty, will in the same bulk, contain their double in
heart and timber; and that in one, the heart will not be so big as a
man's arm, when the trunk exceeds a