beech; the periods when these three forest trees predominated in succession tallying pretty nearly with the ages of stone, bronze, and iron in Denmark."
All over Germany, except in the sandy plains of the north, it is one of the principal forest trees; but, so far as we have seen, does not—or is rarely allowed to attain—such a great size as in England. In Central and Southern Germany and in Eastern and Southern France it seems to be indigenous only in hilly districts and mountains.
In the north of France it attains perfection, and forms very large forests, usually mixed with oak, which sometimes contain trees of immense height, but is not planted as an ornament to parks as much as in England.
According to Huffel's Economie Forestière, 362 (1904), the finest beech forest in France is that of Retz, also called Villers Cotterets, which contains 37,000 acres, on a soil composed of deep sand, mixed with a slight proportion of clay. The trees consist almost entirely of beeches, there being only a small number of oaks and hornbeams. In the best plot of this forest, the canton of Dayancourt, which is 30 acres in extent, there were, in 1895, 1998 beech trees, 20 oaks, and 16 hornbeams. The beeches contain 329,433 cubic feet of timber, and reach a height of nearly 150 feet with clean stems of 80 to 90 feet. Their age in 1895 was 183 years, and they were considered to have reached their maximum development and to be on the point of going back.
In an account of the beech, Mr. Robinson has stated in Flora and Sylva that in the forest of Lyons-la-Foret, near Rouen, beeches of 160 feet in height are found; but on asking my friend M. Leon Pardé, inspector of forests at Beauvais (Oise), near Paris, whether this statement could be confirmed, he was good enough to send me a letter from the forest ofiicer there, who says that the tallest beech known in France is the one which I saw in the Forêt de Retz, when the English Arboricultural Society visited France in 1903,[1] the height of which was given as 45 metres, about 147 feet. This tree measured 13 feet 2 inches in girth, and was straight and clear of branches to 91 feet. It was estimated by the English measurement to contain 560 cubic feet to the first branch, or 700 feet in all. This letter goes on to say that the tallest trees at Lyons-le-Forêt do not, in his opinion, exceed a total height of 35 metres, though one has doubtfully been stated to attain 37½ metres.
Two of the finest and tallest beeches in France are the one called "La Bourdigalle" in the Forêt de Lyons at La Haye (Seine Inf.), which is 35.80 metres high by 5.55 metres at 1 metre, and is supposed to be from 375 to 575 years old.[2]
Another called "Le Trois Hêtres," in the forest of Brotonne at Guerbaville (Seine Inf.), has three straight clean stems rising from a single base to a height of nearly 35 metres, with a girth at 1 metre of about 18 feet. This very remarkable tree is figured on plate xi. of the work cited below.[2]
In Switzerland pure beech forest is found as high as 4500 feet, and at 5000 assumes a shrubby habit.
In the Austrian Alps and Carpathians it is also a common tree, forming vast forests, which are sometimes pure, sometimes mixed with other trees.
