13. There was a cloyster of the right French elm in the little garden near to Her Majesty’s the Queen-Mother’s Chappel at Somerset-House, which were (I suppose) planted there, by the industry of the F. F. Capuchines, that would have directed you to the incomparable use of this noble tree for shade and delight, into whatever figure you will accustom them. I have my self procured some of them from Paris, but they were so abused in the transportation, that they all perished save one, which now flourishes with me: I have also lately graffed elms to a great improvement of their heads. Virgil tells us they will join in marriage with the oak, and they would both be tryed; and that with the more probable success, for such lignous kinds, if you graff under the earth, upon, or near the very root it self, which is likely to entertain the cyon better than when more exposed, till it be well fixt, and have made some considerable progress. 14. When you would fell, let the sap be perfectly in repose; as ’tis commonly about November or December, even to February, after the frost hath well nipp’d them: I have already alledged my reason for it; and I am told, that both oak and elm so cut, the very saplings (whereof rafters, spars, &c. are made) will continue as long as the very heart of the tree, without decay. In this work, cut your kerfe near to the ground; but have a care that it suffer not in the fall, and be ruined with its own weight: This depends upon your wood-man’s judgment in disbranching, and is a necessary caution to the felling of all other timber-trees. If any begin to doat, pick out such for the axe, and rather trust to its successor. And if cutting over-late, by floating them 2 or 3 months in the water, it prevents the worm, and proves the best of seasons.