1876.] 



AND HORTIGULTURIST. 



855 



hood. This may be true, or it may not, but as 

 the treatment we recommend prevents it from 

 ever flowering at all, no danger need be appre- 

 hended from this cause. 



What we do recommend is to plant in masses or 

 clumps proportioned in size to the surroundings, 

 and of such a form as may best harmonize with 

 the general plan of the place. No particular 

 form of beds need be specified, seeing that these 

 may differ greatly, and yet be in perfect accord 

 with true taste. Patterns appropriate enough, 

 and most natural withal, can often be seen out- 

 lined by the sweeping curves and jagged edges 

 of passing clouds, and by imitating these the 

 ground plans of as appropriate beds may be 

 formed as ever graced a lawn. 



It is of the utmost importance to have the 

 beds throughly enriched before planting, the ob- 

 ject being to grow the leaves to as large a size 

 as possible, and which, under proper manage- 

 ment, might be all of three or four feet in 

 length. 



The after management is simple enough, and 

 consiHts chiefly in regular attention to pruning, 

 which operation can be best performed before 

 the leaves come out in the spring. This is done 

 by cutting to the ground, or in heading down to 

 any desired height, the most advanced shoots, 

 and in the case of small beds, never allowing any 

 of them to remain to be over three or four years 

 old. By this treatment the contour of a group 

 will necessarily undergo important changes, but 

 itfi main features may all the while be kept up 

 to an equally high standard, and so look both 

 pleasing and attractive. Of course, to do this 

 well, fine opportunities will occur for the display 

 of taste and judgment, and just as these are ex- 

 ercised will the effect be satisfactory or other- 

 wise. It does not seem desirable in any case to 

 prune so as to obtain uniformity of height, and 

 small round clumps look best graded from the 

 centre to the circumference; whilst it is better 

 with those that are large and irregular in out- 

 line to imitate so far as practicable such in- 

 equalities as are most imposing in mountain 

 scenery, where bold prominences rise and over- 

 look deep gorges and undulating ridges. In 

 masses so formed the matchless foliage of the 

 Ailanthus can be more strikingly displayed than 

 when grown in any other way, and will also 

 present a more picturesque and imposing ap- 

 pearance than could well be produced by any 

 other deciduous tree or shrub fitted to the 

 climate. 



EDITORIAL NOTES. 



SciADOPiTYS VERTiciLLATA. — The Gardener's 

 Chronicle says : "According to a statement in the 

 Revue Horticole, two plants of Sciadopitys ver- 

 ticillata, each about three feet in height, in the 

 nurseries of Messrs. Thibaut & Keteleer, at 

 Sceaux, have produced cones. We have not 

 heard of the production of cones in this coun- 

 try." [We should be glad to know where is the 

 largest specimen of this very hardy and beauti- 

 ful evergreen in this country, and how high 

 it is.— Ed. G. M. 



Cut-leaved Sumach. — Nearly 30 years ago one 

 of Philadelphia's most excellent botanical florists, 

 Robert Kilvington, found wild in a Chester 

 County wood, the cut-leaved Sumach. Our peo- 

 ple did not seem to take much to the novelty, 

 and we doubt whether Mr. Kilvington, ever 

 made a dollar on it. Perhaps after reading the 

 following from the London Gardener's Magazint, 

 our planters will esteem it more nearly as it well 

 deserves : 



" We know of no cut-leaved shrub or tree, that 

 in departing from its normal condition, so effect- 

 ually disguises itself as does the cut-leaved Su- 

 mach. This is a form of the common smooth 

 Sumach, (Rhus glabra), as delicate and refined 

 in its aspect as the other is coarse and common ; 

 indeed, we have rarely met with a person, even 

 if very familiar with plants, who could identify 

 this by the leaf. Fern-leaved Sumach would be 

 a most appropriate name for it. Our object in 

 noticing it at the present time is to call attention 

 to its value in summer floral decorations, as in 

 all large work of this kind, its leaves produce all 

 the effect of fern fronds, and at the same time 

 hold up much better than most of them do, re- 

 taining their form and freshness for several days; 

 besides — an item of no little importance — they 

 can be produced almost inexpensively. Indeed 

 we are not sure but it would pay florists who do 

 much decorative work to force the plant. As a 

 lawn plant it should always be grown with a sin- 

 gle stem, cutting it back each Fall, to get a start 

 as near the ground as practicable ; if allowed to 

 branch it loses much of its beauty ; if grown for 

 the sake of a supply of its leaves, it would even 

 then be better to treat it in this way, as they are 

 much more luxuriant when the whole vigor of 

 the roots is thrown into a single stem. In early 

 summer a leaf-folding caterpillar sometimes at- 



