ANNUAL MEETING AT SAGINAW. 497 



The giant red-woods of California and the Eucalypti of Australia are 

 remarkable not only for their great size but for their great height, some- 

 times reaching a diameter of thirty feet or more and a height of more than 

 three hundred feet. 



But it is not to their great size alone that many trees owe their fame. 

 Their beauty of form, of foliage and of flower renders them noticeable and 

 interesting to man. Many trees, when standing by themselves, are beautiful 

 and awe inspiring; but when a mass of such trees, of miles in extent, are 

 found together, as loere found in this country, it is not to be wondered at 

 that the primitive inhabitants, who believed in ghosts and omens and charms, 

 should look upon trees with a feeling of reverence. Even to man in his best 

 state of Christian enlightenment there comes over him a feeling of awe as he 

 enters the "forest primeval." There seems to surround him an influence 

 that he cannot explain. He stands in awe of the mighty columns that have 

 stood for centuries, that have increased in size and strength through an un- 

 seen power, a subtle and mysterious power which we call life, that invis- 

 ible and unexplained condition that makes a bond of sympathy between all 

 the living things of the universe. 



I have often envied those old French Jesuits and voyageurs who wandered 

 over this land before the woodman's ax had despoiled it of any of its beauty. 

 I think it a shame that, with all the original wealth of forest that covered this 

 beautiful peninsula, that we have not a single county preserved inviolable 

 from the desecrating hand of the wood cutter and lumberman. We, in this 

 age, know more of the conditions of life than any who have gone before us, 

 but with all our knowledge we have learned nothing to make us despise the 

 heritage that has come down to us from the past. Dynasties have passed from 

 the face of the earth and nations from the memory of man; cities of stone 

 have crumbled into chaotic ruin, and iron tablets gone to dust since some of 

 the monarclis of the forest now standing sprang into existence The mysteri- 

 ous posver which we call life has kept them upright, and we are filled with 

 awe in their presence, as in the presence of the infinite. 



Mr. Lyon — While at New Orleans I saw illustrations of a similar aereal 

 growth to the Banyan tree, in two species ; one was Ficus elastica, Eubber 

 tree, which had developed the tendency very strongly. 



Mr. Peffer — In Wisconsin our law is such for the restraint of animals that 

 in villages and rural districts we are dropping out all unnecessary road and 

 division fences. This improves the appearance of the home surroundings and 

 tends to make better neighbors. 



Prof. Bailey — Here in East Saginaw, I have found some capital illustra- 

 tions of the desirability of removing front and division fences from premises. 

 With a fine margin of grass between the walk and the pavement, the street 

 is given the appearance of a boulevard, when actually the road bed is but 30 

 feet wide. In all these matters, involving landscape gardening principles, 

 there are no definite rules that if followed will suit people. Landscape art 

 is subjective rather than objective. If we can so arrange premises as to call 

 up pleasant associations and imagery the end desired is accomplished. In 

 the division of the topic under discussion I note carpet bedding. Probably 

 there are no more perfect examples of this in the world than on Drexel 

 Boulevard, Chicago ; and still the effects were not pleasing to me. To be 

 sure I was lost in amazement, over the wonderful ingenuity shown by florists 

 in developing, out of growing plants, the unique and grotesque forms; still 



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