SHRUBS 201 



make up your list with the help of good classified catalogues and 

 the lists of shrubs for special purposes referred to at the end of 

 this chapter. 



The only part of this programme that seems hard is the 

 selection of summer or foliage effects. But here's the answer to 

 that Cornus and Viburnum. (See plate 73.) We've got to 

 have lots of those bushes anyhow for autumn and winter effects. 

 They may not be the showiest things in the world when in bloom, 

 but for texture of foliage, play of light and shade, and individuality 

 of bush they are hard to beat. If you want to wake right up to 

 our "heaven-born opportunity" with shrubs, go to Boston in 

 summer and drive through the Arnold Arboretum. For there you 

 will see all the long-lived American and Japanese bushes that 

 have the noblest or most graceful personality, and you will see 

 how cheap and tawdry in comparsion are such Coney Island 

 muckers as the golden elder and purple-leaved plum. And then 

 you will understand what the best landscape designers and 

 nurserymen mean by such words as these: "Flowers are not 

 the main object; they are only an incident. The principal thing 

 is the form, texture, and density of the foliage masses and their 

 way of carrying lights and shadows." I used to think that such 

 talk was only "hot air" by the picayune brand of expert who 

 exalts the technical above the human the letter above the spirit. 

 But it's plain horse sense. For any particular shrub blooms only 

 a fortnight or so; what you have to live with every day for seven 

 months is foliage. 



I am sorry to disappoint you if you were expecting me to tell 

 you how to copy English effects with shrubbery, for there aren't 

 any worth worrying about. Of course, I took about a bushel of 

 notes on beautiful shrubs I saw there, but when I came back I 



