6. There is a compendious expedient for the thickning of copp’ces which are too transparent, by laying of a sampler or pole of an hasel, ash, poplar, &c. of twenty or thirty foot in length (the head a little lopp’d) into the ground, giving it a chop near the foot, to make it succumb; this fastned to the earth with a hook or two, and cover’d with some fresh mould at a competent depth (as gardeners lay their carnations) will produce a world of suckers, thicken and furnish a copp’ce speedily. I add no more of filberts, a kinder and better sort of hasel-nut, of larger and longer shape and beard; the kernels also cover’d with a fine membrane, of which the red is more delicate: They both are propagated as the hasel, and while more domestick, planted either asunder, or in palisade, are seldom found in the copp’ces: They are brought among other fruit, to the best tables for desert, and are said to fatten, but too much eaten, obnoxious to the asthmatic. In the mean time, of this I have had experience; that hasel-nuts, but the filberd specially, being full ripe, and peel’d in warm water, (as they blanch almonds) make a pudding very little (if at all) inferior to that our ladies make of almonds. But I am now come to the water-side; let us next consider the aquatic. FOOTNOTES: {136:1} _De nucum generibus_, vide Macrob. Sect. L. II. C. 14. {136:2} Plantis & duræ coryli nascuntur.................... _Georg. 2._ {139:1} Vallemont, _Physique occult ou traite de la baguet divinitoire, &c._ But concerning the exploration, and superstitious original, see Sir Thomas Brown, _Vulg. Err._ cap. xxiv. sect. 17. and the commentators upon 4. Hosea. 12. CHAPTER XVII. _Of the Birch._ 1. The birch [_betula_, in British _bedw_, doubtless a proper indigene of England, (whence some derive the name of Barkshire) though Pliny calls it a Gaulish tree] is altogether produc’d of roots or suckers, (though it sheds a kind of _samera_ about the Spring) which being planted at four or five foot interval, in small twigs, will suddenly rise to trees; provided they affect the ground, which cannot well be too barren, or spongy; for it will thrive both in the dry, and the wet, sand, and stony, marshes, and bogs; the water-galls, and uliginous parts of forests that hardly bear any grass, do many times spontaneously produce it in abundance, whether the place be high, or low, and nothing comes amiss to it. Plant the small twigs, or suckers having roots, and after the first year, cut them within an inch of the surface; this will cause them to sprout in strong and lusty tufts, fit for copp’ce, and spring-woods; or, by reducing them to one stem, render them in a very few years fit for the turner. For