The Beauty of Expression : its theory, and 

 application to forest trees and landscape 

 gardening. 



Bv THE Rev. J. G. MACVICAR, D.D., LL.D. 



It may be truly said that the forester liolds a phice in art co-ordinate 

 in importance with that of the architect. Kay, the vote might 

 well be in his favour, were it not that the architect is capable of 

 producing an amount of deformity and ugliness which nature will 

 not permit in the forester. 



It is a very fine saying of the poet, — 



" God made the country and man made the town ; " 



and it might have been added that God keeps the country more than 

 the town in His own hand. He is truly its proprietor, and, like every 

 good proprietor, He is very jealous over his trees. In fact, to secure 

 and to protect them He has arranged that if man destroys them it 

 will be to his own cost, by destroying the soil and the shelter and 

 the beauty of the landscape, and consequently the amount of life 

 and enjoyment which his surroundings may impart to him. 



The loss of shelter consequent on the felling of trees is obvious. 

 The degradation of the soil in the same circumstances is not so 

 obvious, and indeed depends greatly upon the latitude. On these 

 points I do not propose to touch here and now ; but I have some- 

 thing to say on the beauty and expression of trees, which appears to 

 me not unworthy of the perusal of the readers of the Jour mil of 

 Forestry. In fact, the enjoyment which is derived from the con- 

 templation of the beauty of nature, and specially of the landscape, as 

 being nature on the largest scale which the eye can take in, is one of 

 the purest enjoyments which is accessible to man. It is also one of 

 the simplest, and involves least trouble to obtaiu, and entails fewest 

 responsibilities. It is, in fact, the cream of the enjoyment which 

 the proprietor himself can have ; while -he on his part has much 

 trouble and many cares. These, if haply they are associated with a 

 rental, do indeed enable him to get many luxuries which the simple 

 beholder of his property may have to go without. But there is 

 not one of these luxuries which in point of pure enjoyment, without 



