The Canadian Horticulturist. 283 



vation. Judicious trimming each year will secure better results than Nature's 

 own work; but be careful not to make a broom-headed shrubbery. If the ground 

 has been thoroughly prepared in the beginning and a good top-dressing given 

 every winter, but little further cultivation will be required, after the plants have 

 grown sufficiently to cover the ground. 



Shrubs and small growing trees should predominate in a small place. Large 

 growing trees thus placed, will in time become obstructions. Broad-leaved ever- 

 greens, while more expansive are, as a rule, better and more permanent for a winter 

 effect on a small place than coniferous trees. The best plants are those nursery 

 grown. Wild plants of certain varieties, if properly handled, will transplant well 

 a nd produce good effect ; but these require experienced skill, else the result 

 may prove unsatisfactory. 



The employment of a trained gardener upon a small or medium-sized place 

 is not practicable. Men offering themselves as gardeners at day laborer's wages 

 are more likely to bring discredit than credit to the profession that requires for 

 success, intelligence, enthusiasm and a true love of the work. A good gardener 

 loves his plants and flowers next to his family, and is as impatient of neglect and 

 bad treatment of the one as of the other. Such a man soon finds and stays in 

 a good position with fair pay. I believe it is safe to say that the majority of 

 those who call themselves gardeners, but who are drifting about, and ready to 

 except a position at any price, are not safe men to have on a place, but can 

 and doubtless would do more damage to it than the proprietor could. For this 

 reason it is better for the owner to employ a willing and industrious man who 

 claims no knowledge of gardening, but will do as he is told and give him direc- 

 tions how to do the work. The errors then made will serve to increase the 

 knowledge and interest of the proprietor and also his man. 



In this writing I have had in view especially small or medium-sized home 

 places. I have hardly touched upon the service a landscape architect may be to 

 the real-estate owner in planning his property to avoid steep grades and heavy 

 cuts and fills ; to preserve and develop the natural features ; in so arranging 

 the lots that each may be accessible and have as nearly equal advantages as pos- 

 sible ; and in planting, to utilize all the material on the grounds; to the village, 

 town or city in designing public recreation grounds ; advising in regard to street 

 tree-planting or roadside improvement ; to cemetries in designing the grounds 

 and their decorations ; to public amusement resorts in providing a convenient 

 and pleasing arrangement of buildings and grounds laid out in a manner to 

 educate and elevate rather than to degrade public taste. I believe the time is 

 not far distant when the man who is to build a new place, or remodel an old one 

 and who wishes to secure the best and most economical result, will call in the 

 landscape architect to help him plan the ground, as he now calls in the building 

 architect to help him plan the building. — W. H. Manning, before Mass. Hort. 

 Society. 



