THE ANNUAL MEETING. 151 



fluence. In passing along a highway, we may be delighted on first approach- 

 ing a row of maples; we examine critically and admire a few specimens, but 

 soon realize that there is something wanting to complete that row as a whole ; 

 but on turning to the opposite side, we forget the maples, and cease to wonder 

 what was lacking, in our admiration for the splendid mixed native growth that 

 has been thinned and judiciously cared for there. Perhaps I can better 

 illustrate my meaning by supposing we are about to commence a new plant- 

 ing. And here at the end of the row, where the roads cross, we will set, 

 say a black walnut, or a whitewood (tulip tree), then three or four sugar 

 maples, next a white ash or so; then, in this low ground, several elms 

 and soft or red maples, and perhaps where wettest a black ash ; and as 

 we rise the warm slope more whitewoods, black walnuts, a butternut or so, 

 and magnolia acuminata, and if bottom land or deep, dark soil occurs, two 

 or three negundo or ash-leaved maple, then three or four silver maples, always 

 ending or beginning with some long-lived, grand tree, such as white oak, 

 black walnut, or whitewood, according to soil, etc. White birch and 

 European larch would have a fine effect in some situations, and white, red, 

 scarlet, and burr oaks, also shellbark hickory, beech, and basswood, with many 

 other deciduous trees are worthy of a place and should receive more attention. 

 Now that stock is shut ofE in many places, evergreens and flowering shrubs 

 could be introduced. 



How delightful to meet now and then by the wayside some favorite rose, or 

 spirea, a rose wiegelia, or Japan quince, or to inhale in early spring days the 

 sweet breath of the Missouri currant, or later to breathe the heavier perfume 

 of lilac or syringa. Then to think of the music of the wind in that grand old 

 white pine, standing as sentinel at the turn in the road, towering up eighty to 

 one hundred feet and rejoicing in a vigorous middle age of two or three cen- 

 turies. 



To some a special attraction of the mixed growth or planting would be the 

 greater variety of birds that would make it their home, for birds, like other 

 bipeds, have their favorite trees. Tlie Baltimore oriole loves to swing his ham- 

 mock to the slender, drooping branches of an elm or silver maple, while the 

 nearly horizontal limbs of some oaks afford an excellent foundation for the 

 nests of humming birds, wood pewees, and others of like habit, and perhaps in 

 some cosy nook among the slender twigs of the same tree may be found sus- 

 pended the beautiful basket-like nest of the warbling vireo. The robin, scarlet 

 tanager, and rose-breasted grosbeck will find convenient forks in sugar maples, 

 white ash, etc. And so nearly all of our tree-building song birds may be 

 suited ; while tliose usually nesting on the ground, such as the meadow-lark, 

 bobolink, song sparrow, and many other sparrows, buntings, finches, etc., in 

 the greater variety of trees can find the right amount of shade or sunshine and 

 just such a perch as they like to use when cheering the passer-by with their 

 songs. 



But to return to the more strictly practical. I wish to say a word in regard 

 to the proper distance for planting, as more mistakes and blunders are made 

 in this — perhaps I may say more ignorance shown — than in anything else in 

 relation to the subject. How often do we see people planting trees 20, 15, 10 or 

 even eight or six feet apart, apparently with the idea that tliey are fully grown 

 already and will never need any more room, when in fact some of those very 

 trees if allowed room for full development, would in time cover a space from GO 

 to 80 feet in diameter? On our lawn is a silver maple with a spread of over 50 

 feet, and a white pine of nearly as much, and both comparatively young. But 



