APRIL. 351 



it may be improved by severely cutting the leader and 

 side branches. The beauty of an evergreen depends 

 much upon being furnished with branches to the ground, 

 and it is a very ungardener-like practice, intolerable to 

 every correct notion of evergreen beauty, to prune away 

 the lower branches and expose a naked trunk. 



Sometimes Pines are inclined to turn up a side shoot 

 as a new leader. Such should be cut away, and in time 

 the leader will come in the right place. If a leader in 

 any conifer is lost by accident, another one may be had in 

 its place, by tying a side shoot in an erect position. The 

 American Arbor Vitae, some of the Firs, as well as others, 

 are inclined to form several leaders, and if allowed to do 

 this they will assume a bad shape. By trimming all the 

 branches, excepting the main one, that will be strengthened 

 and better able to retain its position as leader. 



aVERGEEEN HEDGES AKD CLIPPED TREES. 



The most perfect form of a hedge for pyramidal grow- 

 ing kinds, is one that slopes more or less on the sides, as 

 in figure 78, A, p. 232, thus admitting sun and light to 

 the bottom, as well as the top. This should generally be 

 the form for long hedges. The same engraving gives 

 several forms suitable for shorter hedges of various kinds. 

 In trimming, shears should be used, and the operation may 

 be guided by the help of a stretched line, where precision 

 is desirable, pains being taken to give it an even, unliag- 

 gled appearance. To allow a hedge to go un trimmed for 

 a number of years, is certain to soon injure it beyond all 

 remedy. Most hedge plants naturally grow to forty or 

 more feet in hight, and to allow a row of these standing 

 close in the hedge, to shoot up without check, is to bring 

 disaster to the row in time. 



The trimming of trees that are kept to definite forms, 

 is not materially different in principle from that of hedges. 



