DECIDUOUS TKEES. 33 



sends up several sprouts, making the plant rather a bush than a 

 tree. Its flowers are very fragrant, and as a tree to group with 

 mountain ash on the outskirts of pines, it is one of the most 

 effective. Of the Chinese varieties, the magnolia conspicua and 

 soulangeana are the most generally known ; both are good ; but 

 if we were to select one, it would be the soulangeana, because it is 

 a more rapid grower, and its flowers appear to escape injury from 

 late spring frosts better than the conspicua. Both are perfectly 

 hardy, form spreading, round-headed trees of middle size, and 

 should always be placed where they will form the foreground 

 of a group of evergreens, on account of their flowers being pro- 

 duced early in spring or before the growth of their leaves. 

 There is a variety described as Norlertiana, with habit and 

 growth of the conspicua, but having flowers of a dark purplish 

 color and very fragrant. And another is described as Lenne, 

 with flowers like the soulangeana, but of more than twice their 

 size. 



Magnolia purpurea and gracilis are both shrubs, and will be 

 noticed in their place, we here remarking that their planting 

 and arrangement as undergrowths or foregrounds to the con- 

 spicua and soulangeana are productive of a happy effect. 



MULBERRY Morus. Although not a tree of the highest 

 beauty, yet the native mulberry is not inelegant ; and wherever 

 it can be grown successfully, the great value of its fruit adds 

 much to recommend its adoption in forming groups of deciduous 

 trees, as it harmonizes well with the linden, catalpa, and some 

 others of round heads and broad foliage. In some sections, 

 however, of our Northern States, the trees are tender; and 

 although not often killed entirely, they are frequently injured 

 so much in the branches as to greatly impair their regularity 

 and beauty. The variety now well known as " Downjng's Ever- 

 bearing," raised from seed some years ago by Charles Downing, 

 JSTewburg, N. Y., is as hardy as any; and as its fruit is large and 



2* 



