WEEPING DECIDUOUS TREES. 45 



CHAPTER III. 



WEEPING DECIDUOUS TREES. 



WITHIN a few years the popular taste has been largely turned 

 to the introduction of drooping trees as objects of graceful 

 beauty, harmonizing with the smoothness and verdure of a lawn, 

 or the high keeping and neatness of a pleasure-garden. Indeed, 

 to such an extent has this taste prevailed, that the very object 

 aimed at in their introduction has been often defeated by a too 

 free use of them, as well as by their arrangement in masses, when 

 their side branches which are their peculiar beauty are inter- 

 mingled or hidden entirely, and by their too heedless distribu- 

 tion on all sides. 



Drooping trees, like water fountains, are dangerous in the 

 hands of those who attempt their use in the decoration of 

 grounds without possessing a considerable knowledge and good 

 taste in the composition of a landscape. Gracefulness and 

 elegance being the prominent characteristics of drooping trees, 

 they are shown to best advantage either singly or in wide yet 

 tasteful groups, on lawns or borders, where symmetrical art, 

 rather than the natural picturesque, is sought to be embodied as 

 the leading feature. Where bold expression is desired, they are 

 entirely unfitted ; and when planted mixed indiscriminately with 

 those of upright, round-headed forms, their individual character 

 is lost. Placed on the borders of groups, at sufficient distance 

 to enable them to exhibit their peculiar habits and develop 

 freely their forms, many of the drooping trees may be used 

 effectively, provided the group of which they form a part is 

 composed of trees with similar pensile, although not so distinct, 



