80 MISSOURI STATE HORTICTLTURAL SOCIETY. 



of straight rows has been superseded by clumps and fringes, genius 

 and study are requisite to produce that natural beauty of expression 

 to be recognized by landscape gardening and taste of the present day 



The elements of natural beauty should be characterized by simple, 

 easy and flowing lines. 



Mr. A. J. Downing says : •' He who would create in his pleasure 

 grounds these more delicate shades of expression must become a pro- 

 found student both of nature and art; he must be able, by his own 

 original powers, to seize the subtle essence, the half disclosed idea in- 

 volved in the finest parts of nature, and to produce and develop it ia 

 his landscape gardening." 



Guard well against crowding and filling out at first all vacant 

 spaces. As well as trees you want open spaces of smooth lawn with 

 intertices that aff'ord outward view at such points as most desirable^ 

 Avoid all straight, regular set rows of trees, >as well as drives and 

 walks. Modern taste follows and improves on nature. Trees are set 

 in clumps and fringes, with occasionally isolated trees to secure natural, 

 easy flowing, graceful, quiet surroundings of nature. 



It is no easy matter for a tyro to form a clump of three, four six or 

 eight trees, yet by closely examining examples in our best works on 

 landscaping, and by placing stakes and viewing them from difi"erent 

 standpoints, and at the same time contemplating the full development 

 of each tree, you may acquire an agreeable and pleasing arrangement.. 



In addition to the ornamental, allow me to urge the importance of 

 windbreaks. They may serve as a background or not. One thing is cer- 

 tain, windbreaks are valuable in many ways. If half the money that is 

 spent in building barns was spent in planting windbrakes, it would 

 add beauty and comford and millions in dollars and cents to the State 

 of Missouri. A good windbreak set on every farm of some good, hardy, 

 thrifty evergreens, in a very iew years will not only protect from 

 piercing Wintry blasts of snow, sleet and rain, but furnish a soft, warm 

 bedding for the stock to lie where they can breath pure air and not be 

 subject to surfeit by crowding and the changes from in and out-door 

 influences. Besides this ever acre of trees set in this way will be a 

 valuable investment to the owner, aside from being a benefactor to the 

 age in which he lives, by the increase of timber which induces rain 

 clouds. Whereas, by denuding our domain of its timber belts, it will 

 in time become a barren desert. Such has been the history of ancient 

 countries. 



In 1882 I visited Indiana, where, in my early life, I sold orna- 

 mental evergreen trees from my nursery, and found many of those 

 trees were large enough to be sawed into lumber or posts, and were 



