TEEES, EVERGREENS, AND SHRUBS. 33 



Portugal laurel are almost as bright and glossy as our 

 favourite liolly ; its growth is more compact than the 

 laurel, and it is in some respects a hardier shrub, requiring 

 less pruning, and growing frequently to a good size with- 

 out losing the foliage of the lower branches. This feather- 

 ing down to the ground is a great beauty in evergreen 

 shrubs, and should be promoted by giving them room and 

 air, as well as by judicious pruning. How frequently do 

 we see fine specimens utterly spoiled by being cut away 

 near the ground, the higher branches being allowed to 

 grow out, till the shrub appears as if it would fall 

 over on the spectator. Instead of this, a large laurel 

 should present more the appearance of a sloping bank of 

 foliage, or rather of a pyramid, with the lower branches 

 down to the ground, and spreading out all round. An 

 evergreen thus grown and pruned is a beautiful object, 

 especially on a lawn. 



With respect to the pruning of evergreens, it should be 

 remembered that summer is the proper season for this 

 operation, June or July ; but it too often liappens that at 

 this busy period, when our gardens are bright with flower- 

 ing bushes and smaller plants, our winter friends are for- 

 gotten and neglected, and so " upright growing sorts get 

 round-headed forms, round-headed ones grow to one side, 

 and all, and much more besides, for the want of the prun- 

 ing -knife, or of the finger -and -thumb way of stopping, 

 applied regularly at the proper season." So says Mr 

 Beatoun, in the Cottage Gardener, where also he gives 



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