From the Objectives...'The major objectives of this study were to examine hardwood forests through the entire extent of the pine belt of the Coastal Plain in an effort to determine the hardwood stage, or stages, of the pine to hardwood succession, as a basis for describing or predicting the ultimate forest, so developed. The decision to study this particular type of community was based on the. fact that hardwoods normally succeed pines in all known successions in the region (Gano 1917, Kurz 1944, Heyward 1939, Chapman 1932, Campbell 1955). By obtaining data from such communities, it seemed possible to determine whether or not the regional vegetational pattern portrayed (1) a generalized type of forest common to mesic sites of the entire coastal Plain, (2) a geographically oriented clinal arrangement of communities whose two extremes might be dissimilar to each other by virtue of the differences in ranges of species or of ecological position of species, or (3) a mosaic of communities each tessera of which might bear little or no resemblance to all others.' © by the Ecological Society of America. Abstract reproduced by permission. © by the Ecological Society of America. Abstract reproduced by permission.