Ii8 HAND-BOOK OF TREE-PLANTING. 



the best disposal of the trees. But, so far as 

 we have seen, they all have the fault of ar- 

 ranging them in stiff, straight belts, or in 

 square blocks equally stiff. Now, Nature does 

 not give us straight lines, except in rare in- 

 stances. Only Art does this. Nature moves 

 and builds in curves. Clouds, streams, mount- 

 ains, fields, snow-drifts, all have curved and 

 graceful outlines. The flattest prairie ever 

 seen has at least its occasional gentle swells, 

 as though struggling against the irksome mo- 

 notony of a dead level. And the tree-planter 

 may well take a lesson in this respect from 

 Chicago and what has been done there in her 

 now beautiful parks, which have so changed 

 the aspect of the place. That city is now an 

 object-lesson for all the region around, not 

 only of business energy and success, but of 

 taste and refinement. So effective are simple 

 means when rightly used. In like manner 

 may any dweller on the prairies, by taking 

 advantage of the contours of his fields and 

 massing his trees in graceful forms, make his 

 tree-planting a source of constant beauty as 

 well as substantial benefit. 



