Let us therefore shut up what we have thus laboriously planted, with some good quick-set hedge; which,
............All countries bear, in every ground
As denizen, or interloper found:
From gardens and till’d fields expell’d, yet there,
On the extreams stands up, and claims a share.
Nor mastiff-dog, nor pike-man can be found
A better fence to the enclosed ground.
Such breed the rough and hardy Cantons rear,
And into all adjacent lands prefer,
Though rugged churles, and for the battle fit;
Who courts and states with complement or wit,
To civilize, nor to instruct pretend;
But with stout faithful service to defend.
This tyrants know full well, nor more confide
On guards that serve less for defence than pride:
Their persons safe they do not judge amiss,
And realms committed to their guard of Swiss.[177:2]
For so the ingenious poet has metamorphos’d him, and I could not withstand him.
4. The haw-thorn, (oxyacantha vulgaris) and indeed the very best of common hedges, is either rais’d of seeds or plants; but then it must not be with despair, because sometimes you do not see them peep the first year; for the haw, and many other seeds, being invested with a very hard integument, will now and then suffer imprisonment two whole years under the earth; and our impatience at this, does often fustrate the resurrection of divers seeds of this nature; so that we frequently dig up, and disturb the beds where they have been sown, in despair, before they have gone their full time; which is also the reason of a very popular mistake in other seeds; especially, that of the holly, concerning which there goes a tradition, that they will not sprout till they be pass’d through the maw of a thrush; whence the saying, turdus exitium suum cacat (alluding to the viscus made thereof, not the misselto of oak) but this is an error, as I am able to testifie on experience; they come up very well of the Berries, treated as I have shew’d in chap. 26. and with patience; for (as I affirm’d) they will sleep sometimes two entire years in their graves; as will also the seeds of yew, sloes, phillyrea angustifolia, and sundry others, whose shells are very hard about the small kernels; but which is wonderfully facilitated, by being (as we directed) prepar’d in beds, and magazines of earth, or sand for a competent time, and then committed to the ground before the full in March, by which season they will be chitting, and speedily take root: Others bury them deep in the ground all Winter, and sow them in February: And thus I have been told of a gentleman who has considerably improv’d his revenue, by sowing haws only, and raising nurseries of quick-sets, which he sells by the hundred far and near: This is a commendable industry; any neglected corners of ground will fit this plantation. Or were such places plow’d in furrow about the ground, you would fence, and sow’d with the mark of the cyder-press, crab-kernels, &c. kept secure from cattel till able to defend it self; it would yield excellent stocks to graff and transplant: And thus any larger plot, by plowing and cross-plowing the ground, and sowing it with all sorts of forest-seeds; breaking and harrowing the clods, and cleansing it from weeds with the haugh, (till the plants over-top them) a very profitable grove may be rais’d, and yield magazin of singular advantage, to furnish the industrious planter.
5. But Columella has another expedient for the raising of our spinetum, by rubbing the now mature hips and haws, ashen-keys, &c. into the crevices of bass-ropes, or wisps of straw, and then burying them in a trench: Whether way you attempt it, they must (so soon as they peep, and as long as they require it) be sedulously cleans’d of the weeds; which, if in beds for transplantation, had need be at the least three or four years; by which time even your seedlings will be of stature fit to remove; for I do by no means approve of the vulgar præmature planting of sets, as is generally us’d throughout England; which is to take such only as are the very smallest, and so to crowd them into three or four files, which are both egregious mistakes.
6. Whereas it is found by constant experience, that plants as big as ones thumb, set in the posture, and at the distance which we spake of in the horn-beam; that is, almost perpendicular (not altogether, because the rain should not get in ’twixt the rind and wood) and single, or at most, not exceeding a double row, do prosper infinitely, and much out-strip the densest and closest ranges of our trifling sets, which make but weak shoots, and whose roots do but hinder each other, and for being couch’d in that posture, on the sides of banks, and fences (especially where the earth is not very tenacious) are bared of the mould which should entertain them, by that time the rains and storms of one Winter have passed over them. In Holland and Flanders, (where they have the goodliest hedges of this kind about the counterscarps of their invincible fortifications, to the great security of their musketiers upon occasion) they plant them according to my description, and raise fences so speedily, and so impenetrable, that our best are not to enter into the comparison. Yet, that I may not be wanting to direct such as either affect the other way, or whose grounds may require some bank of earth, as ordinarily the verges of copp’ces, and other inclosures do; you shall by line, cast up your foss of about three foot broad, and about the same depth, provided your mould hold it; beginning first to turn the turf, upon which, be careful to lay some of the best earth to bed your quick in, and there lay, or set the plants; two in a foot space is sufficient; being diligent to procure such as are fresh gathered, streight, smooth, and well rooted; adding now and then, at equal spaces of twenty or thirty foot, a young oakling or elm-sucker, ash, or the like, which will come in time (especially in plain countries) to be ornamental standards, and good timber: If you will needs multiply your rowes, a foot or somewhat less: Above that, upon more congested mould, plant another rank of sets, so as to point just in the middle of the vacuities of the first, which I conceive enough: This is but for the single foss; but if you would fortifie it to the purpose, do as much on the other side, of the same depth, height, and planting; and then last of all, cap the top in pyramis with the worst, or bottom of the ditch: Some, if the mould be good, plant a row or two on the edge, or very crest of the mound, which ought to be a little flatned: Here also may they set their dry-hedges, for hedges must be hedg’d till they are able to defend and shade their under-plantation, and I cannot reprove it: But great care is to be had in this work, that the main bank be well footed, and not made with too sudden a declivity, which is subject to fall-in after frosts and wet weather; and this is good husbandry for moist grounds; but where the land lies high, and is hot and gravelly, I prefer the lower fencing; which, though even with the area it self, may be protected with stakes and a dry hedge, on the fosse side, the distance competent, and to very good purposes of educating more frequent timber amongst the rows.
7. Your hedge being yet young, should be constantly weeded two or three years, especially before Midsummer (of brambles especially, the great dock, and thistle, &c.) though some admit not of this work till after Michaelmas, for reasons that I approve not: It has been the practice of Herefordshire, in the plantation of quick-set-hedges, to plant a crab-stock at every twenty foot distance; and this they observe so religiously, as if they had been under some rigorous statute requiring it: But by this means they were provided in a short time with all advantages for the graffing of fruit amongst them, which does highly recompence their industry. Some cut their sets at three years growth even to the very ground, and find that in a year or two it will have shot as much as in seven, had it been let alone.
8. When your hedge is now of near six years stature, plash it about February or October; but this is the work of a very dextrous and skilful husbandman; and for which our honest countrey-man Mr. Markam gives excellent directions; only I approve not so well of his deep cutting, if it be possible to bend it, having suffered in something of that kind: It is almost incredible to what perfection some have laid these hedges, by the rural way of plashing, better than by clipping; yet may both be used for ornament, as where they are planted about our garden-fences, and fields near the mansion. In Scotland, by tying the young shoots with bands of hay, they make the stems grow so very close together, as that it encloseth rabbets in warrens instead of pales: And for this robust use we shall prefer the blackthorn; the extravagant suckers which are apt to rise at distance from the hedge-line, being sedulously extirpated, that the rest may grow the stronger and thicker.
9. And now since I did mention it, and that most I find do greatly affect the vulgar way of quicking (that this our discourse be in nothing deficient) we will in brief give it you again after George Markham’s description, because it is the best, and most accurate, although much resembling our former direction, of which it seems but a repetition, ’till he comes to the plashing. In a ground which is more dry than wet (for watry places it abhors) plant your quick thus: Let the first row of sets be placed in a trench of about half a foot deep, even with the top of your ditch, in somewhat a sloping, or inclining posture; then, having rais’d your bank near a foot upon them, plant another row, so as their tops may just peep out over the middle of the spaces of your first row: These cover’d again to the height or thickness of the other, place a third rank opposite to the first, and then finish your bank to its intended height. The distances of the plants would not be above one foot; and the season to do the work in, may be from the entry of February, till the end of March; or else in September to the beginning of December. When this is finish’d, you must guard both the top of your bank, and outmost verge of your ditch, with a sufficient dry-hedge, interwoven from stake to stake into the earth (which commonly they do on the bank) to secure your quick from the spoil of cattle. And then being careful to repair such as decay, or do not spring, by supplying the dead, and trimming the rest; you shall after three years growth sprinkle some timber-trees amongst them; such as oak, beech, ash, maple, fruit, or the like; which being drawn young out of your nurseries, may be very easily inserted.
I am not in the mean time ignorant of what is said against the scattering these masts and keys among our fences; which grown to over-top the subnascent hedge, may prejudice it with their shade and drip: But this might be prevented by planting hollies (proof against these impediments) in the line or trench, where you would raise standards, as far as they usually spread in many years, and which, if placed at good distances, how close soever to the stem, would (besides their stout defence) prove a wondrous decoration, to large and ample enclosures: But to resume our former work; that which we affirm’d to require the greatest dexterity, is, the artificial plashing of our hedge, when it is now arrived to a six, or seven years head; though some stay till the tenth, or longer. In February therefore, or October, with a very sharp hand-bill, cut away all superfluous sprays and straglers, which may hinder your progress, and are useless. Then, searching out the principal stems, with a keen and light hatchet, cut them slant-wise close to the ground, hardly three quarters through, or rather, so far only, as till you can make them comply handsomely, which is your best direction, (lest you rift the stem) and so lay it from your sloping as you go, folding in the lesser branches which spring from them; and ever within a five or six foot distance, where you find an upright set (cutting off only the top to the height of your intended hedge) let it stand as a stake, to fortifie your work, and to receive the twinings of those branches about it. Lastly, at the top (which would be about five foot above ground) take the longest, most slender, and flexible twigs which you reserved (and being cut as the former, where need requires) bind-in the extremities of all the rest, and thus your work is finished: This being done very close and thick, makes an impregnable hedge, in few years; for it may be repeated as you see occasion; and what you so cut-away, will help to make your dry-hedges for your young plantations, or be profitable for the oven, and make good bavin. Namely, the extravagant side branches springing the more upright, ’till the newly wounded are healed. There are some yet who would have no stakes cut from the trees, save here and there one; so as to leave half the head naked, and the other standing; since the over-hanging bows will kill what is under them, and ruin the tree; so pernicious is this half-toping: But let this be a total amputation for a new and lusty spring: There is nothing more prejudicial to subnascent young trees, than when newly trim’d and prun’d, to have their (as yet raw) wounds poyson’d with continual dripping; as is well observed by Mr. Nourse: But this is meant of repairing decay’d hedges. For stakes in this work, oak is to be preferr’d, tho’ some will use elder, but it is not good; or the blackthorn, crab-tree, in moorish ground withy, ash, maple, hasel, not lasting, (which some make hedges of; but it being apt to the browsing of cattle, when the young shoots appeared, it does better in copp’ces) the rest not lasting, should yet be driven well in at every yard of interval both before, and after they are bound, till they have taken the hard earth, and are very fast; and even your plash’d-hedges, need some small thorns to be laid over, to protect the spring from cattle and sheep, ’till they are somewhat fortified; and the doubler the winding is lodg’d, the better; which should be beaten, and forced down together with the stakes, as equally as may be. Note, that in sloping your windings, if it be too low done (as very usually) it frequently mortifies the tops, therefore it ought to be so bent, as it may not impede the mounting of the sap: If the plash be of a great, and extraordinary age, wind it at the neather boughs all together, and cutting the sets as directed, permit it rather to hang downwards a little, than rise too forwards; and then twist the branches into the work, leaving a set free, and unconstrain’d at every yard space, besides such as will serve for stakes, abated to about five foot length (which is a competent stature for an hedge) and so let it stand. One shall often find in this work, especially in old neglected hedges, some great trees, or stubs, that commonly make gaps for cattle: Such should be cut so near the earth, as till you can lay them thwart, that the top of one may rest on the root or stub of the other, as far as they extend, stopping the cavities with its boughs and branches; and thus hedges which seem to consist but only of scrubby-trees and stumps, may be reduced to a tolerable fence: But in case it be superannuated, and very old, ’tis advisable to stub all up, being quite renewed, and well guarded. We have been the longer on these descriptions, because it is of main importance, and that so few husband-men are so perfectly skill’d in it: But he that would be more fully satisfied, I would have to consult Mr. Cook, chap. 32. or rather instar omnium (and after all which has been said of this useful art of fencing) what I cannot without injury to the publick, and ingratitude to the persons, (who do me the honour of imparting to me their experiences) but as freely communicate.