INTRODUCTION 



that there was created for them a place of quiet beauty and restfulness, a 

 city with pure air, blue sky, green grass, soaring larks, verdant trees, where 

 they might find solace, comfort, and recreation far from the busy turmoil 

 of the great City and the rush of the work-a-day world. 



STUDY OF WINTER BUDS 



The study of winter buds is a subject of great interest, and they are so 

 definite and constant in their character that trees can be easily identified by 

 this means. The twigs usually bear a terminal bud at the end, and others, 

 known as axillary buds, arranged along the sides in a definite order. In the 

 Ash, Horse Chestnut, and Sycamore they are in opposite pairs at right 

 angles to each other up the stem. 



Then again in the Beech, Elm, and Plane we find them arranged more 

 or less alternately, and we have a spiral arrangement in the Poplar and 

 Oak. In the latter we also find a terminal cluster of five or six buds in- 

 stead of the large solitary bud usually seen in that position. 



The young leaves within the bud are usually protected by bud scales, 

 varying in number from a few to very many, as in the Oak, where we find 

 twenty or more pairs of scales before a leaf is seen. The outer scales are 

 often leathery, and may be either covered with hairs, or with a resinous 

 secretion, so familiar in the buds of the Horse Chestnut. These are all 

 means for keeping out damp and moisture, and for moderating the changes 

 of temperature within, where any sudden freezing or thawing might rupture 

 the delicate tissues. When the bud-scales die they leave rings of scars, and 

 the distance between each set of rings represents a year's growth, so that 

 it is easy to tell the age of a twig by counting these intervals. The fallen 

 leaves also give characteristic scars, differing very much according to the 

 species, but this is well seen in the Horse Chestnut, where they have the 

 likeness of a horse-shoe, the resemblance to the nails being conspicuous in 

 the ends of the fibro-vascular bundles of the leaf. 



The bud-scales vary much in colour, reds, browns, and greens being most 



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