276 



THE GARDENERS' MONTHLY 



[September, 



shire, was, in 1769, 52 feet in circumference, but 

 vandalism has taken away mucli of the famous 

 tree to make drinking cups and other mementoes. 



In the United States we have no very old trees, 

 of course, but there is a noble fellow in German- 

 town on the grounds of Amos Little, which was 

 planted soon after the revolution ; and there 

 was, if not now, a very fine specimen on the 

 grounds formerly of Miss Longstreth in King- 

 sessing, which was planted by Young, who was 

 the competitor of Bartram for the honors of 

 being the " King's botanist," and who actually 

 was the first to get the singular Dionaea or 

 Venus Flytrap, to England alive. We have not 

 seen this Yew for many years, but suppose the 

 " march of improvement " will some day slay it, 

 if it has not already done so. 



Plantation of H. G. Russell, of East 

 Greenwich, Rhode Island. — The Philadelphia 



Weekly Press says this gentleman has 230 acres 

 of forest planting. Part was planted this spring 

 with two or three-year-old plants of White Pine. 

 The land is coarse gravel or pure sand, and forms 

 anarm of land in Narragansett Bay. It was con- 

 sidered totally unfitted for agricultural uses. The 

 trees are set thickly and it is proposed to thin after 

 a while, and the cost of cutting out paid by the 

 thinnings. White Pine has been found to outgrow 

 the Scotch Pine on this land in time. The Scotch 

 grows faster at first, and hence should be planted 

 with the view of being the kind thinned out. Larch 

 has also been tried. The rows of Larches are four 

 feet apart, and stand "quite thickly in the rows." 

 The Pines are in every fourth row, and are 16 feet 

 apart in each row, so when Larches and Scotch 

 Pines are all taken out the whole will be a pure 

 White Pine forest with trees sixteen feet apart. 

 TheAilanthus has been but a partial success. 



Natural History and Science. 



COMMUNICATIONS. 



DENUDED NOR'WAY SPRUCES. 



HY H. F. HILLENMEVER. 



The presence of small evergreen branches under 

 the trees at the close of winter first attracted my 

 attention two years ago. I do not think it the 

 work of squirrels, for the twigs may be found on 

 the new-fallen snow under isolated trees where 

 it is certain that neither squirrels nor mice have 

 visited them. That the injury is caused by .an in- 

 sect is highly improbable, as the twigs are found 

 in greater abundance during periods of severe 

 cold. The presence or absence of snow seems to 

 be immaterial as a factor to the work. I hope 

 that during the coming winter the cause may be 

 positively determined. Lexington, Ky. 



[We are somewhat of the opinion of Mr. Hillen- 

 meyer, though the specimens from Prof. Buckhout 

 show squirrels do sometimes cut the branches. 

 On our grounds we have no squirrels, and yet the 

 trees are as thickly strewn with branchlets — 

 broken at the articulation — not cut by teeth — that 

 the ground surface beneath the trees is covered. 

 Prof. Riley finds no trace of insect life at the place 

 of fracture.— Ed. G. M.] 



THE ROSE— ITS PLACE IN ANTIQUITY 

 AMONG FLOWERS. 



BY JOS. H. BOURN. 



The Greeks adored the rose, and the Romans 

 bestowed praises on this flower of the highest an- 

 tiquity. Anacreon sang its primal birth. Homer 

 praised its form of grace, and borrowed the 

 brilliant colors to paint the glowing richness of 

 the rising sun. Herodotus exulted over the sixty- 

 petaled varieties which grew spontaneously in the 

 gardens of Midas in Macedonia. Catullus vaunted 

 its charms, and Horace admired the "richly-tinted 

 face whose bloom is soon fled." Virgil contrasts 

 1 the pale sallow with the blushing hues, and extols 

 the roses of Pastum with their "double spring." 

 These costly ornamental gardens, destroyed al- 

 most ten centuries ago, no longer shed the morning 

 fragrance of rose perfume. Nettles and brambles 

 entangle the footpath of the traveller, and as a po- 

 etic memory the cyclamen and the violet now trail 

 among the debris of the old city. Ansonius, at the 

 very end of Latin literature, draws from the rosaries 

 of Pastum a picture of beauty doomed to premature 

 decline, "and watched the luxurious rose-beds all 

 dewy in the young light of the rising dawn star." 

 Roses 1)ore away the palm from all the flowers 



