48 HEDGES, WINDBREAKS., SHELTERS, ETC. 



developing the beautiful. It is not enough that one 

 shall employ a landscape artist, to get the highest 

 good from this home-creating. A home should be 

 the growth of a man's soul into house and land. If 

 you follow out this idea you will soon discover where 

 a strictly ornamental hedge will assist you in making 

 your home more home-like, and where a hedge, 

 partly for utility, will best accomplish the ends which 

 you seek. 



If a hedge has gone wild for a few years, the 

 question arises, what can be done with it. If the 

 hedge be deciduous the problem is not so generally 

 one that cannot be answered. Cut it down nearly 

 or quite to the ground, as your first step toward 

 improvement. Then inaugurate a system of careful 

 trimming, not too severe; but let the rapid growth 

 have considerable free play. Give the plants one 

 or two feet of new development the first year. Or 

 if the hedge has been neglected for only a year or 

 two, you may cut it down to two or three feet in 

 hight, carefully shaping the hedge as you cut it. 

 Deciduous hedges have always this advantage that 

 they can be built up again after neglect, whereas you 

 cannot do anything of the sort with evergreen 

 hedges. I shall refer to this topic again in connec- 

 tion with evergreens, but may as well say here that 

 if an old evergreen hedge has gaps that you wish to 

 fill up, this may be accomplished with no difficulty 

 if you will have patience; whereas, if the hedge is 

 badly killed in places and thoroughly out of shape, 

 cutting back will do no good ; it must be destroyed. 



