WEEPING DECIDUOUS TREES. 



53 



are familiar to all, is neglected, yet it deserves the attention of 

 every planter of weeping trees. It may be that because we have 

 so often watched the willow droop and dip its branches in the 

 water of some stream or lake, seeming as it were to sympathize 

 with and kiss the sparkling drops that it disturbed as the gentle 

 winds swayed its tresses of light and elegant foliage, we have 

 come to love it, and regard no water landscape as complete 

 without the graceful flowing lines of the old Babylonian willow. 

 From long usage it has come to be associated with either water 

 or the sadness of life in the one case indicative of a marshy 

 region or stream of water, in the other of the last resting-place 



FIG. 25. AMERICAN, OR FOUNTAIN WILLOW. 



of friends once on earth. Beautiful as it is in itself, however, 

 these very associations preclude its introduction into almost any 

 suburban or even extended country place. By the side of a 

 spring at the foot of a hill, or bordering a stream where crossed 

 by a bridge, or in large grounds, shading almost entirely from 

 view the under-gardener's house, are some of the places where its 

 position produces a satisfactory effect ; but if planted near where 

 art and architecture have combined to give a tone of grandeur 

 and magnificence, its form of outline and waving spray seem 

 rather to weaken than add to the appearance of cultivation and 

 refinement 



