THE GENESEE FARMER. 



157 



AMERICAN TBEES AND TEEE-PLANTEES. 



There has always been a party in this country, 

 ith views and feelings opposed to the destruction 

 ■ our native forests. At first small, and little 

 eeded, this party has gradually increased, until it 

 3W numbers its thousands. Their fitting title 

 ould be that of American Philarborists or Tree- 

 ivers. Their doctrine is that trees have economic 

 id aesthetic uses which entitle them to be re- 

 jected in the forest, and largely planted in or- 

 lards, avenues and parks. They claim that trees 

 lake generous returns for the room they occupy, 

 he close relation of trees to the public prosperity, 



seen in the present difficulty of finding sufficient 

 ater for the Erie Canal. The enlargement of the 

 anal and its business requires more water than 

 irmerly, when, in fact, the supply is alarmingly 

 jficient. There is one reason for this deficiency 



the wasteful cutting down of forests on the hill- 

 des, whence flow numerous small streams that 

 lite to till the vast aorta of our inland commerce. 



The destruction of trees not only diminishes the 

 isolute quantity of rain, but prevents its accumu- 

 ,tion in springs, shaded valleys, and swamps. A 

 ire hillside will shed water like a roof. Let the 

 •ees remain as nature intended, and the same soil 

 jcomes a sponge, absorbing the rain as it falls, and 

 nding it down little by little to the thirsty lowlands. 



In the early stages of our country's growth, little 

 tention was paid to the culture of trees. The 

 imes of the pioneer Philarborists are few, and 

 leir chief encouragement seems to have come 

 om across the Atlantic. There is a queer old 

 )use still standing on the banks of the Schuylkill, 

 lat might be called the Cradle of American Bota- 

 j. It was built by John Barteam, who founded 

 le first Botanic Garden in this country. Bartram 

 as an honest Quaker, little noticed at home, but 

 anored abroad, as a collector of rare trees and 

 ants. He kept up an active correspondence with 

 ninent savans in England. Dr. Darlington's re- 

 jnt publication of these letters created a pleasant 

 fervescence in the literary circles of Europe and 

 .merica. Andre Miohatjx, and his son Francis 

 NDRE MiOHAus, should be remembered. They were 

 renchmen, and served the French government, 

 et most of their scientific labor was performed in 

 lis country. They were heartily attached to 

 .merican institutions. They sent home about 

 xty thousand trees and plants, with many baxes 

 F seeds, as the result of their searches in our na- 

 on's wilds. The younger Miohaux lived to be 

 ighty-five, and spent his last days in planting a 

 roup of American trees. His North American 

 ylva, recently edited by J. Jay Sinxn, of Phila- 

 elphia, has no equal on the subject which it treats, 

 [e bequeathed $22,000 to Societies in Bo;-ton and 

 'hiladelphia, for special purposes connected with 

 tie propagation of useful trees. 



Among the early Pomologists, William Coxe, 

 f New Jersey, stands foremost. His work on the 

 lultivation of Fruit- trees was prepared without 

 luch help from previous authors, and is still ap- 

 ealed to as reliable authority. Mr. Coxe sent 

 cions of the Seclcel Pear to the London Horticul- 

 aral Society, of which he was soon after elected a 

 aember. 



The name of Downing is dear to every lover of 

 Ural improvement. His Treatise on the Theory 



and Practice of Landscape Gardening, published in 

 1841, gave him a solid and brilliant reputation on 

 either side the Atlantic. The book was thoroughly 

 practical, yet all alive with poetry and sparkling 

 sentiment. It was read like a romance, and re- 

 moved the scales from eyes previously blind to the 

 beautiful in trees and landscapes. The youngest 

 son of a gardener on the Hudson, Downing was so 

 reserved in his habits, that few suspected the rare 

 qualities of his mind, before his appearance as an 

 author. He had grown up as a neglected seedling 

 might have done in an out-of-the-way corner of 

 his father's grounds untH its rich ripe fruit caught 

 the gaze of passers-by, and pregnated the air with 

 daintiest aroma. Downing was thought, by some, 

 to be unsocial and haughty ; yet there never lived 

 a man more intensely American. It was a favorite 

 idea, with him, that America was entitled to a 

 style of Architecture distinctly its own, and suited 

 to our climate, scenery and habits. The working 

 out of this idea is clearly seen in his Essays and 

 drawings. He was partial to American trees, and 

 often exposed the folly of preferring such exotic 

 impositions as the Ailanthus and the Abele, to the 

 Maple, the Elm, and the Liriodendron. His whole 

 life, genius and ambition, were devoted to the ele- 

 vation of his countrymen, to the improvement of 

 their homes, and the multiplying of their ennobling 

 pleasures. His premature death, in 1852, so pain- 

 fully remembered with the burning of the Henry 

 Glny^ was an irreparable loss to American litera- 

 ture and art. 



Living Philarborists are doing much, at this time, 

 to promote the knowledge and culture of desirable 

 trees. Never was there a period when so much of 

 capital, enterprise and research was given to this 

 most important branch of national industry. The 

 peculiar and promising feature of the present en- 

 thusiasm in tree-culture, is that its friends are 

 forming themselves into groups, for particular 

 studies and experiments. In the cultivation of 

 Pears, Marshall P. "Wilder, of Dorchester, Mass., 

 takes the lead. He has rendered his countrymen 

 an important service by testing, under his personal 

 inspection, hundreds of imported varieties, a large 

 proportion of which were found to be unsuitable 

 for this country. 



Henry W. Sargent, of Fishkill, has honorably 

 won the position of an oracle on Evergreens. Or- 

 namental planters are waiting with impatience for 

 the promised work that shall embody the results 

 of his large experience with Evergreens hnported 

 from foreign nurseries. — Ex. from Prof. North's 

 Address 'before N. Y. State Ag. Society. 



THE PEACH IN ILLINOIS. 



North of about 36° the peach tree is always 

 more or less tender ; and were it not for its habit 

 of bearing while young, it would be folly for us 

 of the North to plant it ; and yet no fruit pays bet- 

 ter, when you get it ; and up here we most always 

 have fruit when there are flowers. So far the fruit 

 buds have winter-killed much oftener than the tree ; 

 though I have seen three large crops and some par- 

 tial ones in this vicinity, and a few" trees 12 to 15 

 years old, previous to 1856, when all were killed; 

 and for that matter there was a pretty general win- 

 ter-killing once before — about 1842. One good 



