there are 109,000 trees over 16 inches in diameter, 4000 of which are decayed or diseased. Only trees over 9 feet in girth are marked for felling; and these are being cut down gradually, two or three trees in each spot, so that gaps are left in which seedlings may spring up. Though good seed years occur about once every three years, natural regeneration is always difficult on account of the poverty and dryness of the soil, and only occurs in open spaces exposed to sunlight. As a great deal of the best timber has been removed in past years, the number of excessively large trees is limited, there being only thirteen over 14 feet in girth. The largest tree now standing, the “Roi des Laricios,” is growing in a dense part of the forest at 3850 feet altitude, and measured 143 feet in height by 18 feet 9 inches in girth, with a clean stem to 100 feet. Plate 113, from photographs taken by me, shows the stem of this tree and a dense stand of pines. Plate 114, from a negative kindly lent us by M.A. André, Inspector of the French Forest Service, shows very well the peculiar habit assumed by the Laricio in old age, the crown becoming remarkably flattened, owing to the bending over of the leading shoot and the increase in size of the upper branches, which become very stout and horizontal or even curve slightly downwards. The frontispiece is reproduced from a sketch taken in Corsica by the late Robert Elwes of Congham, Norfolk.
In this forest the presence of a considerable number of diseased trees is probably explained by the fact that some twenty years previously most of the large trees had been tapped for resin, an operation which was not justified by its financial results, and which exposed the trees to the attacks of fungi. In many parts of the Valdoniello forest, as in parcelle F, the trees are very tall, and stand very close together, and have beautifully clean stems, showing that the tree bears crowding without injury. The foliage of the trees in Corsica struck me as being denser than is the case usually in isolated trees growing in England; and I agree with Prof. Fliche that the canopy of Laricio is considerably denser than that of the Scots pine, and as a corollary that plantations should not be over-thinned. In Corsica, as only trees of large size are saleable, no thinning operations are ever attempted.
The railway passes through another fine forest, that of Vizzavona, which is about 3400 acres in extent. The trees here are as a rule younger than those at Valdoniello, and in many parts of the forest are mixed with beech, between 3000 and 4000 feet. In one place it was evident that, owing to an excessive felling of Laricio several years ago, the young forest coming up will consist almost entirely of beech. In pure stands of young but tall pines there is usually a slight undergrowth of beech and holly. Near the forester's house I measured a large tree, 145 feet high by 12 feet 3 inches in girth, which was growing at 3200 feet altitude.
With regard to the size attained by Laricio in Corsica, a tree in the forest of Pietropiano with a short stem measured 23 feet in girth. In the forest of Marmano trees have been felled which were clean in the stem to 115 feet, and yielded 950 cubic feet of dressed and squared logs. At Aitone there is a fine forest of Laricio which I was unable to visit from Valdoniello, as the pass across the mountain was impassable owing to deep snow. I was informed that the forest of Asco has been
