1 76 BROAD-LEAVED EVERGREENS 



evergreens are good smoke-re sisters. However, I should never plant 

 them without providing a scheme for washing them every day, if 

 necessary, since evergreens are not beautiful when dusty. 



THE WINTER EFFECT 



America ought to be redeemed from its present bleakness and 

 ugliness in winter. The chief elements in that reform will be the 

 shrubs with vivid berries and branches (such as the Japanese 

 barberry and the red- twigged dogwood), because they give the 

 cheapest and quickest results. But these bushes, being leafless, 

 show brightest against an evergreen background. This is all the 

 more reason for broad-leaved evergreens at the base of every 

 dwelling house where they will grow. For winter in the North is 

 five twelfths of the year, or rather the trees are leafless as long as 

 that. 



We must not run too much to rhododendrons, for in zero 

 weather their leaves hang down, curl in, and look most unhappy. 

 Mountain laurel is one of the cheeriest in winter. We can get 

 superb bronzes from Azalea amoena, arching wands from Leu- 

 cothoe, amazing lustiness from Berberis Japonic a, a perfect carpet 

 of running myrtle where grass will not grow, and above all, the 

 never-fading glories of American holly. 



FOUR EFFECTS WE CAN*T HAVE 



We can never hope for any tree effects among broad-leaved 

 evergreens in the North. In England the holm oak, or ilex of 

 Italian gardens (Quercus Ilex), will sometimes attain fifty feet. 

 On the other hand, England can never rival Magnolia grandiflora 

 of the South or the Christmas berry of California. We shall never 

 equal English hedge effects. It is possible to have miles of holly 

 hedging in the North, but practically it is only a rich man's plant. 



