92 The Landscape Gardening Book 



f erent from all the rest in many ways ; the ash-leaved maple or 

 box elder, quick growing and from fifty to seventy feet high — 

 this, by the way, does not look like a maple at all to untrained 

 eyes — is still different; and then there are three small species 

 which are scarcely more than shrubs — the moimtain maple, 

 growing to thirty feet, the striped maple which ranges from a 

 shrub to forty feet, and the dwarf maple of the west which stops 

 at twenty-five feet. These are sufficiently dissimilar in size, 

 shape and color to furnish variety in abundance when added to 

 the group. 



The form of a tree is important architecturally when it is to 

 be placed in intimate relation with a building which belongs to a 

 distinct style or period. With the Gothic, for instance, trees of 

 the Gothic type should be used — poplars and any of the spire- 

 shaped evergreens are examples — for harmonious lines are more 

 effective than those which oppose. This is of course a fine point 

 and need not ordinarily be raised, for ordinarily our dwellings 

 are not designed with such strict adherence to the purity of a 

 style as to demand such care in their surroundings. It some- 

 times presents itself, however; usually after a wrong selection 

 has been made. I mention it for the benefit of those to whose 

 case it may apply. 



Shade and shadow in their relation to the living picture which 

 all planting aims to create, are subject to the same laws of com- 

 position that govern the painter's use of them on his canvas. A 

 landscape is cheerful or gloomy, happy or sad, according as 

 light or shade predominate in it. It is a difficult matter to say 

 just what the proportion shall be, and even more difficult for an 

 untrained eye to determine just what it is, in any given landscape ; 

 but approximately light and shade should balance, with the 

 excess running a little to shade under most circumstances. 



