CHAPTER XXXVIII 



SECOND WEEK IN OCTOBER 



THE garden is still glowing with the gorgeous tints of 

 autumn. In planting climbers and shrubs we should 

 not forget this evening-time of the year, when 

 Nature seems to put on her gayest tints before retiring for 

 the sleep of winter. Ampelopsis (both of the older variety, 

 A. quinquefolia and A. veitchii) should be freely planted, 

 not only to cover the house, but also to drape lower walls, 

 and even to ramble over rough places and the stumps of 

 trees ; both are self-clinging, needing no nails after they 

 once begin to ascend, and nothing can excel their rich tints 

 at this time of year. Even in a city the gay garlands of 

 these plants are now attractive, for they will live and thrive 

 where nothing else can do so. 



In the shrubberies the same bright carmine gleams out 

 amongst the green from the elegant feathery foliage of the 

 sumach (Rhus glabla laciniata), a small tree, which should 

 be in every garden, with the commoner stagshorn sumach 

 (R. typhina), too, in preference to many a dull evergreen ; 

 then the newer introduction from the East, Parrotia persica, 

 flames with rich colouring at this time of year. This, too, is 

 a small tree, and although it comes from tropical Asia it 

 has proved quite hardy here, notwithstanding that it gave us 

 many a qualm during the first spring after planting, as the 

 foliage gave no sign of appearing until the end of May. 

 Probably this is the secret of its hardiness, for in this way it 

 escapes the bitter winds of spring, and, being deciduous, it 

 is thoroughly dormant in winter. 



Then there are many of the beautiful American maples, 



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