90 FLOWERS AND FOLIAGE OF SUMMER. 



lawn may be made in America in spite of difficulties of 

 climate. 



If then shade is most important to make the lawn 

 attractive and lovely in summer, it naturally behooves us 

 to study our summer shade trees. As we undertake this 

 task we find with regret that we must give up the enjoy- 

 ment of some of our grandest shade trees as having already 

 reached and passed their prime. Horse-chestnuts that 

 formed one of the chief beauties of the foliage of late 

 spring and early summer have probably fallen into the 

 " sere leaf " and become dull and rusty in many places by 

 the end of July. Elms are majestic at all seasons, but their 

 leaves often fade by midsummer. Lindens, except the 

 sulphured and dasystyla, and possibly the silver-leaved, are 

 now fading also. Ashes are fresh, and several willows and 

 poplars, but many trees have assumed a mature and even 

 languid appearance, that suggests at once the permanent 

 presence of a more sober stage of existence and a feeling 

 that the tree is resting. 



There is scarcely yet much positive decay. Light and 

 life have for them settled down to a consciousness of com- 

 pleted development which, if, on the whole, a satisfactory 

 state of things for the present, suggests quite distinctly the 

 approaching end. 



The best shade tree at this season, if not at all seasons 

 of the year, is the beech. This fact was recognized by the 

 ancients, and is still apparent to most tree lovers of the 

 present day. It is true, the beech grows slowly, but did 

 ever any enduring, really fine tree grow otherwise than 

 slowly. The elm and other grand trees may be un- 



