Notes ajid Gleanings. 185 



Evergreens for the Million. — A good many of our readers have 

 heard of Robert Douglas of Waukegan, aforetime, as a nursery-man, a pear- 

 grower, and, for a considerable number of years, as a grower of evergreens ; 

 in the latter as an innovator, inasmuch as he has made bold to contend that 

 evergreens can not only be grown in this country, but from seed, so that it 

 would /«j', — quite a feature to an energetic business-man. 



We recollect, some eight or ten years ago, we used to be astonished to see 

 what a lot he raised, when probably, all told, his plantation did not average 

 more than a city lot of ground, say twenty-five by a hundred feet. He was 

 then feeling his way, and, like all men of his class, kept increasing his breadth, 

 until now he stands without a rival in the country ; and probably has more one- 

 year-old seedlings than all the rest of the country put together ; that is, cul- 

 tivated. 



Quite a number of your readers scarcely understand, perhaps, what is re- 

 quired to bring young evergreens through the first two seasons from seed. It 

 is, that they must have some shade from the burning rays of our hot summers. 

 Now, in small quantities, this is not so much of a job ; but, when one comes to 

 acres to be so covered, one will at once see it cannot be done without expense 

 and trouble. At the time we first knew Mr. Douglas, this covering consisted of 

 continuous beds, covered with slats or laths about as far asunder as the latter 

 are wide, and raised about nine inches or one foot from the ground. This idea 

 appears to have succeeded well enough while the breadth to cover was con- 

 fined to an acre or two ; but then the time of constructing, and the quantity of 

 latlis required, began to be a serious obstacle to further progress. Nothing 

 daunted, Mr. Douglas erected posts six feet apart or so in the rows, and 

 twelve between ; nailing fence-boards edgeways on these about six feet high, 

 and covering a matter of three or four acres in one patch with branches of 

 trees laid on this framework. To the eye these beds have a very pretty effect, 

 not unlike a young growth of grass just springing up. In the winter, all these 

 small chaps are covered with leaves or litter : some are thinned out and sold ; 

 others stand from one to two years longer in the same position, and are sold as 

 two or three years old, or transplanted at home for more extended culture. 



The sorts grown are mainly Austrian, Scotch, and white pine ; Norway and 

 white spruce ; balsam, larch, and American arborvitas ; with smaller lots of 

 choicer sorts ; with one very pretty bed of Lawson's beautiful cypress, that, so 

 far. looks capitally. A little is done with evergreens from the forest, but, as 

 compared to the seedling business, is but a trifle. However, in the American 

 arborvitag, he has a matter of two hundred thousand, all planted out and doing 

 well, — all obtained from the woods. 



To give an idea of something like the quantity grown here, it is estimated 

 that there are six acres 6f these seedlings of this year's growth, all covered one 

 way or another. Deduct one-third of the ground as alleys, wastage, &c. ; allow 

 an average of, say, twenty-five to the square foot, — and it surely is little enough ; 

 for the arborvitce particularly are as thick as they can stand, at least one 

 hundred to the foot, — and we have the nice little number of nearly four and a 

 half millions. To sow this amount of ground required one ton of seed. Think 



