86 TREES 



At last, away they sail, to start new trees if they fall in 

 moist soil. 



The European hornbeam was a favorite tree for making 

 the "pleached alleys," of which old-world garden-lovers 

 were proud. A row of trees on each side of a promenade 

 were pruned and trained to cover an arching framework, 

 and to interlace their supple branches so that at length no 

 other framework was needed, and one walked through a 

 tunnel of green so closely interlaced as to make walls and 

 roof that shut out light and wind and rain! Hedges, 

 fences, and many fancies of the gardener were worked out 

 with this hornbeam, so willingly did it lend itseK to cutting 

 and moulding into curious forms. 



Hop Hornbeam 



Ostrya Virginiana, Willd. 



The hop hornbeam has habits like the other iron wood and 

 an equal reputation for the hardness of its wood. The 

 tree, however, wears scaly, shaggy brown bark, suggesting 

 in its manner of scaling off the shagbark hickory. Its 

 nutlets are packed separate in loose papery bags, and to- 

 gether form a loose, cone-like cluster, like the fruit of a 

 hop vine. The wind scatters these buoyant little bags, 

 that travel far. 



This tree often twists in growing, and the trunk shows 

 spiral furrows. "Hard-tack," "beetle- wood," "lever- 

 wood" — all take us back to the pioneer who put this wood 

 to such good uses, and who was glad to have these little 

 trees growing in his woodlot. In hickories, even, he had 

 not the equal of them for strength and hardness. 



