942 



PRACTICE OF GARDENING. 



Part III. 



shapes, with round heads ; the English elm and ash have long narrow forms, and round 

 heads ; the beech and horse-chestnut, compact ovate forms, with obtuse heads ; the spruce 

 and pine tribes, in general, have conical shapes, and pointed spiry tops ; the Lombardy 

 poplar, cypress, and most willows, have long narrow shapes, and oblong tops. 



6798. Color. The Scotch pine, yew, and horse-chestnut, are dark-green ; the larch 

 and elm, a yellow-green ; the abele, Huntingdon willow, a silvery-green, &c. 



6799. Mode and time of growth. The nature of some trees is to lose their lower 

 branches as they increase in height, as the fir tribe ; and others have a tendency to retain 

 them, as the wych elm. In some the branches descend, and often recline on the ground, 

 as the lime-tree and platanus. Some are very compact in their foliage, as the horse- 

 chestnut ; others very open, as the ash and acacia. Some have drooping spray, as the 

 weeping-willow ; that of ojhers tend upwards, as in the Lombardy poplar ; horizontally, 

 as in the oak ; and obliquely, as in the Scotch pine. Some grow with rapidity, as the 

 Carolina and Athenian poplars ; others very slowly, as the oak and the stone pine. 



6800. Duration. The most durable of trees is the oak ; the least so, some of the 

 poplar and fir tribes. A medium is to be found in the elm and lime. 



6801. Expression. Some trees convey ideas of utility in the arts, and mark the attention 

 and industry of man, as having planted them for this purpose, as the oak, ash, elm, &c. 

 Others are known, or supposed to be of little use, and convey ideas of neglect or of wild- 

 ness, as the hornbeam, sorb, trembling poplar, &c. Some indicate general improvement 

 and artificial plantations, as the larch, and spruce fir ; others, garden-scenery or plantations 

 near a house, as the cedar, stone pine, and platanus. Some indicate rich deep soil, as the 

 oak ; and rich thin soil, as the elm ; others, chalk or gravel, as the beech ; rocky ground, 

 as the ash ; marshy ground, as the alder ; the proximity of water, as the willow. There 

 are also natural expressions belonging to trees, partly from general, and partly from acci- 

 dental association; as strength and stability to the oak, ease and elegance to the birch, sweet- 

 ness to the lime, gloom to the cypress and yew, melancholy to the weeping-willow, &c. 



6802. The common hardy shrubs may be similarly arranged ; but it will be sufficient to class them ac- 

 cording to magnitude, mode of growth, evergreen, deciduous, native, naturalised, and exotic. 



6803. Magnitude. Some shrubs are high, approaching to the character of trees, as the mespilus and 

 y h 



6804. Mode of growth. Some'are creepers, as the ivy ; climbers, as the virgin's bower ; trailers, as the 



oily; 



common holly ; others very low, as the butcher's broom and dwarf-birch. 



bramble ; compact forms, as that of the arbor vitas ; open airy branches, as in the tamarisk ; and sin- 

 gular branches, as those of the stagshorn-sumach. Some, as shrubs, soon acquire picturesque shapes, as 

 the thorn, holly, and elder. Some are evergreens, as the holly, laurel, yew, laurustinus, arbutus, &c. 



6805. Deciduous, as the guelder-rose, lilac, syringa, &c. 



6806. Native, as the holly, privet, hazel, thorn, briar, &c. 



6807. Naturalised, as the rose, syringa, lilac, laburnum, &c. 



6808. Exotic, or foreign, as the rhododendron, azalea, &c. 



6809. These arrangements as to the effect of trees and shrubs in landscape, as far as form, magnitude, 

 mode of growth, and expression are concerned, refer to plants growing detached from other trees, and as 

 nearly full-grown. It is less intended to comprehend every characteristic distinction than to suggest to 

 the artist the principal light in which he ought to view trees and shrubs. Nor could he with confidence 

 attempt planting, with even such a knowledge, as could be obtained from the above arrangement, com- 

 pleted by inserting all the names under their proper heads ; for unless he has seen the majority of the 

 full-grown trees himself, both singly and connected in groups and masses, and is acquainted with the 

 comparative rapidity of their growth in different climates and soils, he cannot well foresee the result of 

 his labors, or look forward " with the prophetic eye of taste" to certain beauty. Of this there are nu- 

 merous proofs, arising from the unjust preference given to exotics of unknown shapes and duration, in 

 situations where the general form and situation of the tree, or even of one or two trees, is of the utmost 

 consequence to the effect of a whole. How frequently on a lawn, or in a plantation near a house, do we 

 see acacias, cut-leaved elders, variegated sycamores, &c. where the oak, cedar, beech, lime, or Spanish 

 chestnut would have produced a much more impressive general effect ! 



Sect. II. Of the Classification of Plantations, or Assemblages of Trees. 

 6810. Assemblages of trees, whether natural or artificial, differ in extent, outline, dis- 

 position of the trees, and kind of tree. 



6811. In regard to extent, the least is a group {fig. 628. e and d), which must consist at least of two 

 plants ; larger, it is called a thicket {b c) ; round and compact, it is called a clump (a) ; still larger, a 

 mass ; and all above a mass is denominated a wood or forest, and characterised by comparative degrees 

 of largeness. The term wood may be applied to a large assemblage of trees, either natural or artificial : 

 forest, exclusively to the most extensive or natural assemblages. 



6812. With respect to the outline, or ground-plan of a plantation, the simplest disposition is that of a row 

 or line, which may be either straight or crooked, as in hedges, or lines of trees ; next that of any deter- 

 minate shape, as round, exemplilied in the clump; square, in the platoon ; oblong, in either clump 

 or platoon, and in stripes, screens, or belts ; irregular or indeterminate, in thickets, masses, and all 

 larger plantations. 



6813. With respect to the disposition of the trees within the plantation, they maybe placed regularly in 

 rows, squares, parallelograms, or quincunx ; irregularly in the manner of groups : without under, 

 growths, as m groves {fig. 629. a, b) ; with under^rowths, as in woods (c) j all undergrowths, as in copse. 



