14 NOVEMBER 1829, Page 13

,VINEYARDS IN BELGIUM—OAK PLANTING ON HEATHS.

Is any of your countrymen delight in a most beautiful and picturesque road, be- yond any drive I know in Europe, (I do not except the beauties of the Rhine.) let them take the tour from Namur to Liege along the banks of the Meuse. Half- way on this delightful road, stands the town of Huy ; which, with its lofty castle and ancient cathedral, forms a scene that deserves to be painted by a first-rate artist. his in this neighbourhood that the culture of the vine has begun within these few years. The attempt was at first laughed to scorn; but still the vine- yards are extending, and the soil and situation are admirably adapted to the plant. In this respect it excels the Rhine district of vines; for the soil is an open lime- stone rock, precisely similar (from my own observation) to that of the Clos de- Vojeau and Chamhertin in Burgundy. The site is sheltered from the north and east winds ; and is on sloping banks. The grime appears to me to he the red peon grape of Burgundy. I tasted near Huy of the vintage 1825 ; anti found it a very pleasant cool wine—much superior to the via ordinuire of Bourdeaux. Good wine, however, can only come from long-planted vineyards; and I have no doubt but the wines of the vale of the Meuse may rival in time those of the Hockheim. I think the proprietors err in taking to the culture of red wines. An stl1ienti01111C0Pers 119wCYRri rePlicfl 19 RI), objectiug, 044 lb wine-merchants were in the habit of purchasing these small red wines to eke out the quantity of imported wines. This is a singular instance of the establishment of vineyards in our days, where no vines ever before were cultivated. I observed in some grape-houses in North Holland, and probably to be found in other parts, a very rational method of training the vine. In place of training the stems, as we do, along and under the rafters of the hot-house, they were trained between the rafters on wires running across, and no leaves were allowed to remain between the spaces. The bunches thus had the entire influence of the sun, and the only leaves were under the rafters. The success was great; the bunches were large and finely ripened. The subject of planting trees has long engaged my attention. In a very high inland district between Liege and Spa, I was much pleased with the preparation of the ground previous to the spring plantation of oak plants fur future copse wood. Even Mr. WITHERS, the opponent of Sir WALTER Scores system of planting, would be pleased with the plan. At the astute time, I cannot allow Mr. WI l'IlERS to judge in this question till he witness, as I have done, the wholesale style of Scotch plantations; the soil planted and the progress made front ten up to sixty years. Plantations after Mr. WITHERS' theory would eat up a Scotch estate ; but under their system the plantation of forty or fifty acres annually, of ground not worth half a crown an acre, is never felt. The ground to be planted in this district of Liege was at least 1,200 feet above the level of the sea, and was perfectly heath-clad. With a kind of mattock, or rather a clumsy adze, having an open cleft in the middle, and each side yell sharpened, a labourer was cutting up slices of the sod of a foot anti a half Mug and ten inches broad. Ile worked the adze as a carpenter would. These slices be dexterously rolled up with his instrument in a conical shape, and placed them up- right ; the heath and grass side being innermost. I thought, on looking over Ins work, that the operation was tedious ; but on returning next day, I found he hid got over more ground than I expected he could have done. I proposed to him the paring spade of the Irish and Scotch Highlander; but he said that such an instrument would not cut off a slice sufficiently long, which was essentially ne- cessary, that the heath might rot effectually during the winter. The ground to be planted was thus left perfectly bare of all vegetation. In the spring; the young oaks are thickly planted by pitting ; and an w the rolls of heath sodare suffiCiently rotten, they are beaten down in autumn to nourish the plants. I consider this the perfection of heath planting, and the cost of paring elf the sod, rolling it up, and setting it up, cannot exceed twenty shillings an acre. For larch plantations I think it is unnecessary, but it is the most likely way to succeed with oaks.

After visiting the oak woods of the districts of Liege, of the forests of the Ar- dennes, of Nassau, and of Juliers and Bergh, I ant satisfied that the oak trea can adapt itself to more varieties of soil and site and climate than any other tree I