258 THE NEW GARDENING 



thinner. He will have to make the first general decision 

 as between the great deciduous forest trees and the 

 smaller evergreen Conifers, and then that between 

 individual species. 



Conifers are for the immediate garden circle, and 

 deciduous timber trees for the landscape. One may 

 bring a Conifer, in circumstances, close to the walls of a 

 house, a timber tree rarely. Conifers are for the lawn, 

 the " dressed grounds," the flower-garden ; deciduous 

 trees are for the outskirts, the avenues, the wide, open 

 spaces that reach out towards the horizon. 



There is something irritating about Conifers to the 

 man of the woods. He hates them for their smug sym- 

 metry, their feline sleekness, their silent primness. Ac- 

 customed to the varying outline of the great Oaks, Elms 

 and Beeches, to their play with the wild, sweeping winds, 

 to their shouts of glee and protest, he cannot enter into 

 sympathetic relationship with those stiff, columnar 

 kinds that have almost the air of having been clipped 

 by the scissors of a giant. 



The gardener does not know any such chagrin. His 

 eye is trained to symmetry. He admires the even, 

 pyramidal habit of the Conifers, their close, compact 

 verdure, their self-contained and dignified bearing. He 

 likes their feathery plumes, their tapering spires, their 

 trunks clothed to the very base with foliage. 



Every garden-maker must learn to use the Coniferous 

 trees. They grow with a slow and measured precision, 

 which can be calculated almost to a nicety. They do 

 not send long, greedy roots foraging afar, and robbing 

 the smaller occupants of the garden. Summer and 

 winter they present the same serene front to the gardener 

 and the storm-gods. They do not throw long, dripping 

 arms over the borders, or flooc} the garden with leaves in 



