1. _Ulmus campestris._—The English Elm, though not the producer of the most valuable timber, or of a kind for more refined purposes, is still one of the most extensively useful of any kind whatsoever. The long straight balks of this Elm caused it at one time to be employed for water-pipes; these can be readily cut into boards of great length and width, which are useful for a variety of purposes. Selby sums up an account of its character as follows:— The wood when matured is of a deep-brown colour, compact and fine-grained; according to Loudon, it loses nearly two-thirds of its weight in drying, as when cut it weighs nearly seventy pounds the cubic foot, and when seasoned not more than twenty-eight pounds and a half. In the lateral adhesion of its fibre it surpasses the _U. montana_, though perhaps inferior to it in longitudinal toughness, and therefore not capable of supporting so severe a cross strain. The former property, however, eminently qualifies it for every purpose where a strong wood that will not split or crack, either from concussion or the action of sun and wet, is required; on this account, Matthew, in his able treatise on naval timber, strongly recommends it for the “blocks, dead-eyes, and other wooden furniture of rigging.” In country carpentry it is very extensively used in all the Southern parts of England; but the purposes to which it is applied it is unnecessary to enumerate, these having already been described by Evelyn and subsequent authors. Its durability under water, as well as the straightness and great length of its stem, qualifies it for making the keels of large ships, for which purpose it sells at a very high price. As an ornamental tree for general purposes, few can surpass the elm, as when well-grown and not too much interfered with by the forester, it has a gracefully aspiring form without a disposition to lankiness: its foliage is thick enough to afford any amount of shade, and yet is never of a heavy appearance. It flourishes best in good deep soil, in which the most solid balks are grown: when planted on poor land or on gravel-beds it decays at the heart at a very early age. Some of the English elms in Hyde Park have thus decayed, whilst others have attained a respectable size and age, having been injured by storms:— The wintry winds had passed And swept an arm away, And winter found a wound at last, In which to work decay.