244 . STATE HORTICULTUKAL SOCIETY. 



employer argued from that that the woman was observant and orderly — two 

 qualifications that he highly appreciated. "Whenever you walk over sticks and 

 brush and rubbish in your yard, that disfigure its tidy appearance, instead of 

 picking them up, remember that you are "stepping over the broom," and 

 somebody will pass judgment upon you by what you may be pleased to call very 

 insignificant indices. But the judgment in most cases will be quite correct. If 

 every man, woman and child about the premises were trained to pick up and 

 remove from view all rubbish and litter that he or she comes upon in walking 

 about a yard or lawn, there would always be an appearance of neatness and 

 tidiness preserved at little cost or trouble. 



ORNAMENTAL TREES, SHRUBS AND VINES. 



FOR TREE PLANTERS. 



No man of our acquaintance has so much sympathy with trees and plants as 

 "Will. "W. Tracy, of Detroit. He cannot bear to have a tree misused and 

 believes most thoroughly that to succeed with plants one must love them. He 

 talks thus sensibly about tree planting: 



There is nothing in the vegetable world which has more individual character 

 and expression than our native trees. Every one possesses a form and expres- 

 sion peculiarly its own, distinct from that assumed by any other even of the 

 same species, and it is this wonderful variability which gives such an indescrib- 

 able charm to the natural landscape — a charm which rarely exists to the same 

 degree where the trees have been transplanted. I attribute this inferiority of 

 transplanted trees largely to the method of pruning or cutting back at the 

 time they are set out. For the most part the trees that now ornament our 

 village streets and country roads were hastily taken up from the neighboring 

 fi.elds and forests, and the greater portion of the tops were cut off until what 

 was a tree became a simple pole or stick with a few stubs projecting like the 

 pegs of a hat tree — a resemblance which doubtless suggested the name for this 

 useful article of furniture. They were then drawn with exposed roots, to the 

 desired point, where the roots were crowded into a hole, into which earth was 

 shoveled, and straightway the men were ready to move on to the next. If the 

 tree grew, it threw out a few leaves and shoots distributed irregularly and 

 ■without form about the top, and the next season these grew vigorously into a 

 dense ball of foliage little resembling the graceful spray of its brother left 

 undisturbed in the fields, looking rather, as a "chemical" friend aptly said, 

 like " gigantic green swabs," and furnishing good models for the trees of wire 

 and green cotton that we find in our children's "Noah's arks." I admit that 

 ultimately the tree outgrows its mutilation, but it takes long years to do it, and 

 it rarely regains its individuality, so that transplanted trees of the same species 

 are in a great measure counterparts one of another. 



How immeasurably superior the result would be if trees were used which 



