230« 



ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. 



PART 111. 



not so well clothed, especially near the surface of the earth." (Gen. Re]). Scot., 

 vol. iv. p. 477.) 



No tree is better adapted than the spruce fir for planting in narrow strips 

 for shelter or seclusion ; because, though the trees in the interior of the strip 

 may become naked below, yet those on the outside will retain their branches 

 from the ground upwards, and effectually prevent the eye from seeing 

 through the screen. The tendency of the tree to preserve its lower branches 

 renders it an excellent protection to game; and for this purpose, and also for 

 the sake of its verdure during winter, when planted among deciduous trees, 

 and cut down to within 5 ft. or 6 ft. of the ground, it affords a very good and 

 very beautiful undergrowth. The tree bears the shears ; and, as it is of rapid 

 growth, it makes excellent hedges for shelter in nursery gardens. Such hedges 

 are not unfrequent in Switzerland, and also in Carpathia, and in some parts 

 of Baden and Bavaria. In 1814, there were spruce fir hedges in some 

 gentlemen's grounds in the neighbourhood of Moscow, between 30 ft. and 40 ft. 

 high. At the Whim, already mentioned, p. 2297., a spruce fir hedge (/g.2223.) 

 was planted, in 1823, 

 with plants 10 ft. high, 

 put in 3 ft. apart ; and, 

 with the exception of 

 three left to shoot up, 

 for the purpose of be- 

 ing clipped into or- 

 namental figures, the 

 whole were cut down 

 to 5 ft., and after- 

 wards trimmed to the 

 shape represented in 

 the figure. The hedge 

 was first cut on Ja- 

 nuary 25., the year 

 after planting ; and, 

 as the plants were 

 found to sustain no 

 injury, about the end 

 of that month has 

 been chosen for cut- 

 ting it every year 

 since. Every portion 



of this hedge, Mr. M'Nab observes, " is beautiful and green ; and the annual 

 growths are very short, giving the surface of the hedge a fine healthy appear- 

 ance." (Gard. Mag., vol. xiii. p. 254.) 



As an ornamental tree, all admirers of regularity and symmetry are partial 

 to the spruce, unless we except the author of the Planter^s Knlendar, who 

 says that, next to the Lombardy poplar and the Scotch pine, it is the least 

 ornamental of common trees ; the meaning of the writer probably being, 

 that it has less variety in itself. Gilpin is evidently no great admirer of the 

 tree ; but still he allows it to have its peculiar beauties. " The spruce fir," 

 he says, " is generally esteemed a more elegant tree than the Scotch pine ; and 

 the reason, if suppose, is, because it often feathers to the ground, and grows 

 in a more exact and regular shape : but this is a principal objection to it. 

 It often wants both form and variety. We admire its floating foliage, in 

 which it sometimes exceeds all other trees ; but it is rather disagreeable to 

 see a repetition of these feathery strata, beautiful as they are, reared tier 

 above tier, in regular order, from the bottom of a tree to the top. Its 

 perpendicular stem, also, which has seldom any lineal variety, makes the 

 appearance of the tree still more formal. It is not always, however, that 

 the spruce fir grows with so much regularity. Sometimes a lateral branch, 

 here and there, taking the lead beyond the rest, breaks somewhat through 



