It thus happens that the time for felling is midsummer or midwinter. The best time for felling, according to some, is midsummer, when the leaves are fully expanded, and the sap has ceased to flow, and the extraneous vegetable matter intended for the leaves has been dislodged from the trunk of the tree by the common sap, leaving it in a quiescent state, and free from that germinative principle which is readily excited by heat and moisture, and if the timber were cut while it remained, would subject it to rapid decay and to operations of worms. Midwinter, amongst some, is chosen as a time for felling, as it is stated that winter-felled heart-wood is less affected by moisture, and likely to be the best and most durable; but as the only peculiar recommendation which that time possesses is the facility which it affords for gradual seasoning, by which timber is rendered less liable to split and get distorted, and slow drying being generally available at any season under shade and shelter, midsummer appears for many obvious reasons the most expedient. In general, all the soft woods, such as elm, lime, poplar, willow, should be felled during winter. In some kinds of trees a little after midsummer appears to be decidedly the best time for felling. Alder felled at that time is found to be much more durable; and Ellis observes, that beech when cut in the middle of summer is bitter, and less liable to be worm-eaten, particularly if a gash be cut to let out the sap some time before felling. Mr. Knowles states that, “About Naples, and in other parts of Italy, oaks have been felled in summer, and are said to have been very durable.” Most of the trees in southern Italy are felled in July and August, and the pines in the German forests are cut down mostly in summer time, and it is stated that their wood is sound. The following are advocates for winter felling, viz. Cato, Pliny, Vitruvius, Alberti, Hesiod, De Saussure, Evelyn, Darwin, and Buonaparte. Some of them consider that winter-felled timber, which has been barked and notched in the previous spring, loses much of that half-prepared woody matter, containing seeds of fungi, &c., that there is no doubt of its superiority to summer-felled timber. The age at which trees should be felled, and the most suitable time for the work having been determined, there are two other things which claim attention.