OBSERVATIONS ON PLANTING ORNAMENTAL TREES. 35 



tree, and again, from the highest to the lowest. But as some shrubs 

 will not flourish under certain trees, their respective situations de- 

 mand consideration. These shrubs may indeed exist under such 

 unfavourable circumstances, but their unhealthy appearance will 

 never be pleasing. Where the shade of any tree is too powerful for 

 laurel or privet to thrive, ivy may be planted with advantage, if it be 

 desirable to cover the ground with evergreen. 



In proportion as the shrubbery or plantation recedes from the 

 dwelling, it should become more rural in its character, more especially 

 if the house be in the cottage style. Here climbers, and such plants 

 as require the support of others, are to be introduced. The most 

 delightful groups in a pleasure-ground are generally those where 

 nature, freeing herself from the shackles of art, depends only on her 

 own assistance for support. Her beauty is chiefly to be seen there 

 where her various creations combine spontaneously, and without 

 restraint. 



The means by which these plants raise themselves up, so as to 

 offer their flowers to the sun, are as various as they are curious, and 

 they seldom blossom whilst trailing on the ground. The ivy and 

 bignonia ascend by the help of little fibres, which fix themselves to 

 the bark of trees or crevices in walls so tightly as to render their dis- 

 engagement a difficult thing to be accomplished without injury to the 

 trunk or building they are attached to. The honey-suckle, like the 

 hop, twines itself spirally around the trunk or branches of trees, and 

 often clasps them so closely as to make an impression on the hardest 

 timber. Others, as the vine and passion-flower, rear themselves by 

 means of corkscrew tendrils, which hold so fast that the strongest 

 winds seldom disunite them from their support. Some plants climb 

 l)y means of a hook in their leaf-stalk, or have a kind of vegetable 

 hand given them, by which they are assisted in mounting, as the pea 

 and several others. 



To return from this digression. — The sombre, gloomy walk of 

 yew, cypress, or holly, should lead to the spot from which there is 

 the most beautiful prospect, or to the gay parterre, where Flora has 

 diffused her flowery beauties ; as the contrast, particularly if sudden, 

 adds greatly to the cheerfulness of the terminating view. 



Bad taste is seldom more conspicuous than when we see trees or 

 plants marshalled in regular order, and at equal distances, like beaux 



