TREES AND SHRUBS FOR WET GROUND. 307 



plants. The American nurserymen are careless about growing stocks 

 of their own trees, but seed is offered, and so there need be no difficulty 

 in getting a stock of it for a bold group to grow in time into a lovely 

 picture. 



The summer-leafing Cypress. A noble tree for deep, wet soils 

 is Taxodium distichum. In valley soil it is superb, and always 

 the better near water. It will often grow in water as well as 

 by its side, and there are many examples of it doing well in the 

 valleys of the Seine and Loire, as well as in the Thames valley. 

 To me it is the queen of the water-loving trees of the northern 

 world. 



The Sitka Spruce. Among evergreen trees I have found nothing 

 so good as this, a native of the tree-clad Pacific coast. It is, in our 

 climate, quite at home, and all the better if in a silty place. I have 

 planted many with good results in soils not always very wet, at first, 

 5 feet apart, with the common Spruce between, which was cut out in 

 due time. But its great use is for wet spots in wood or copse ; a 

 noble tree. 



Yew. Our native Yew is not averse to a wet wood, one of the 

 places where it should be safe from horse and cow, so often killed 

 by it in the open. A group is often a favourite shelter for pheasants 

 in bad weather. The nursery forms of the Yew should never be 

 planted, none being so good as the wild Yew. The " Irish " Yew is 

 a poor formless over-planted tree, one of the shoot variation that may 

 occur in any group of wild Yews in or out of Ireland. 



Hemlock Spruce {Abies canadensis], a fine valley tree of North 

 eastern America, is quite hardy in Britain, and thrives in wet land. 

 Some I planted near the lake thrive and are graceful trees, though it 

 is rarely the tree is so good as in its own country. 



UNDERWOODS. 



If underwoods are to be attractive there are many good things to 

 start with, apart from the native shrubs that come of themselves. In 

 the wooded counties the native covert is sufficient for most needs, but 

 there being total absence of good, hardy evergreen underwood it is 

 well to note how we can aid it from garden sources and so get under- 

 wood from hardy shrubs. Good evergreen covert can be easily made 

 there. 



Palmate Bamboo. A very interesting form of evergreen growth 

 has come in our day, the hardy Bamboos of Japan and China. The 

 above is a fine grower, not too high. For many years in a wet wood 

 here it has been most effective. Other hardy kinds, too, may thrive, 



