14 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



pleasant yard. Small evergreens can be had one foot high for ten to fifteen cents , 

 trees two years old, of the varieties given, at about the same price ; shrubs, two 

 years old, at five to ten cents ; roses at fifteen to twenty cents, herbaceous plants 

 at five to twenty cents. The total expense of such planting of such a place need 

 not exceed $10 to $15, and will prove the best investment a man ever made on a 

 farm 



The roads and paths should be as few and simple as are needed only, because 

 they take more time to keep them well than any other thing on the place. A drive 

 from the gate, circling or straight, to the side of the house, and thence to the barn, 

 with a path from the front gate to the front and side of the house, is all that is 

 needed. This path if angling or curved will be much the better, but never so much 

 so as to cause a person to turn out of the way in going from the hou&e to the gate. 



The back yard may be used for indiscriminate planting, and many things not 

 proper to go into the front yard cjn be used in the rear,and without so much system . 

 In fact, it may be a mixed mass or a conglomeration if you chose to have it. Plant 

 thickly, and if some die you do not miss them, and as soon as they begin to crowd, 

 take them out by transplanting or cutting down. Do not be afraid to cut down 

 wAew necessary, any more than you are to plant wjAere necessary. On my own place 

 I have cut down twice as many trees as I have left, and will have to do more of it. 



The planting of larger places, or ornamentation of city homes, is not in the 

 province of my paper, and yet I cannot help but notice the great mistake that the 

 city people are making of letting their places be so much crowded as to spoil their 

 beauty. I find that to be the case much more so in California than even in our 

 own State. One fine, well-perfected tree, with plenty of green lawn, makes a 

 prettier show than a dozen planted too closely, and one well-grouped clump of 

 trees is much more beautiful in a lawn than would a dozen scattered here and there. 

 If you do plant thickly or indiscriminately, be sure in after years to begin your 

 thinning in time. 



Ornamenting our country homes can be very much assisted by roadside plant- 

 ing. Not by any means planting in single lines of trees about the roads, but if the 

 road is straight, then, by afi means, plant the trees in groups along the road ; and 

 at every corner, especially, make a clump of trees. If the road is irregular or is 

 very winding, then one, or still better, two or three rows of trees along the line, 

 lends much beauty to the drive. But one straight line of trees along a straight 

 road is too much of a sameness, and especially so if the land is very level and the 

 road very long. 



Such planting adds very much to the beauty of our country homes, and its 

 tendency is to build up and elevate the tone and character of our people. A road- 

 side planted in groups gives a very pleasing effect to the traveler. And then you 

 all know that trees do so much better when growing together than in single rows. 

 A road with a clump of elms here, a clump of maple there, one of white ash, one 

 of pine, one of larch, one of sycamore, one of spruce and one of cedar, will give 

 such a delightful sense of relief to the passer-by that he invariably falls in love 

 with the surroundings. 



I wish that I might arrange a plan of planting and have a cut made, with the 

 number and varieties of each kind of tree, which would be of some assistance to 

 those who would learn; but it is with this matter as with many others with which 

 the horticulturist has to deal. He is a teacher and a preacher to every one whom 

 he meets, both by example and precept. I believe that he is the most liberal- 

 minded of all our public men, and is able and willing to give advice without money 

 and without price, and yet the people will not always follow. 



