244 THE RENOVATION OF OLD PLACES. 



be planted again. When the air and sun have been let in to the 

 roots and tops of the best large trees and shrubs, and the lawn is 

 completed about them, it may be that the effect of your lawn, and 

 the trees that shadow it, will be nobler ii you omit altogether all 

 the smaller shrubs. Large trees and shrubs are robbed of half 

 their beauty if they have not a fair expanse of unbroken lawn 

 around them. 



VINES ON OLD TREES. Some evergreens, the balsam-fir for 

 instance, and the hemlock when it is old, become gloomy-looking 

 trees. The black oak and red oak have also a similar expression, 

 though entirely different in form. If such trees stand where more 

 cheerful and elegant trees are needed, the desired improvement 

 may be made by enriching the ground near their trunks, and plant- 

 ing at their base, on both sides, such vines as the Chinese wistaria 

 and the trumpet-creeper, which will cover them to their summits in 

 a few years with a mass of graceful spray and luxuriant leafage.* 

 The Chinese wistaria is probably better adapted to cover lofty 

 trees than other climbers, but the trumpet-creeper, Virginia-creep- 

 er, the native varieties of the clematis, and the Japan and Chinese 

 honeysuckles, may all be used. The wild grape-vine is admirable 

 for filling up trees of thin and straggling growth, such as the oaks 

 before named. The hardy grape, known as the Clinton, is well 

 adapted to this use, while very good wine can be made of its 

 fruit. Perhaps no flowering vine excels it in luxuriance of foliage- 

 drapery, but its prolific fruitage renders it necessary to bestow a 

 good deal of time in gathering the clusters scattered among the 

 branches of a lofty tree. There is no question that the value of 

 the fruit will far more than pay for the labor, but unless picked 

 clean every year it may disfigure both the tree and the lawn. 

 Whether the birds will insure against any damage of this kind we 

 have not had the means of learning.. 



* An exquisite example of the effect of such planting is an old hemlock at " Cottage Place," 

 Germantown, Pa. The tree is three feet in diameter and eighty feet high. At a little distance it 

 cannot be recognized as a hemlock, so completely is its lofty summit crowned with a magnificent 

 drapery of the waving foliage of the Chinese wistaria. A root of the wistaria was planted on each 

 side of the trunk. Their stems are now from six to eight inches in diameter. 



