94 



Garden and Forest. 



[February 20, iS 



establishing this or any other plant in ground filled with 

 the roots of old trees is found in the dryness of the soil, 

 from which the tree-roots absorb all the moisture, rather 

 than in the absence of hght. Periwinkles or other shrubs 

 used in this way will require, therefore, careful watering 

 until they are fully established. When the shade is not 

 dense almost any shrub can be successfully used under or 

 among trees. The common Privet, the Barberry, Wild 

 Roses, the native Cornels, Viburnums and Blueberries can 

 all be used for this purpose. Rhododendrons, although 

 they will not bloom in the shade, are good under-shrubs, 

 and so is the Mahonia in those parts of the country where 

 it is hardy. The growth under the dense forests of the 

 southern AUeghanies, especially in the neighborhood of the 

 streams, is often carpeted with a beautiful evergreen 

 Andromeda (A. Catesbm^, which is one of the best of the 

 shade-supporting plants. It is hardy in New England with 

 a little careful protection. There could be found probably 

 no better dwarf under-shrub for the Middle States than the 

 European Hypericwn ca/ycinum, the so-called Rose of Sharon 

 — a low, dwarf plant, which produces large yellow flowers 

 during the summer, and which is very generally planted in 

 England under trees, and always delights Americans who 

 visit English gardens. This plant is not, unfortunately, 

 very hardy in northern and eastern New England. 



It is desirable, when possible, to plant the under-growth 

 at the same time the trees, which are to shade it, are planted. 

 If this plan is adopted the shrubs get a secure hold upon 

 the ground, and become established before the trees are 

 large enough to shade the ground, or to draw from it all 

 its moisture. If this plan is adopted there is hardly a 

 shrub Avhich cannot be used in this way, although it must 

 be remembered that there are few plants which can pro- 

 duce flowers abundantly without sunlight. — Ed.] 



Mutilating Street Trees. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir. — The people of St. Louis have for some years been 

 in the habit of pruning and pollarding their trees, chieiiy 

 Ailantlius and Sycamore, but Maples and Elms in many 

 instances. This treatment is usually given to young trees as 

 soon as they have reached the height of the second-story 

 windows, but for the past three or four years a severer method 

 has been practiced, and trees that have struggled successfully 

 with the vicissitudes of a city life until they have attained con- 

 siderable size, have been topped off down to branches at least 

 four inches in diameter. One row of some twenty or more 

 Sycamores has been mangled to this extent by the neighbor- 

 hood-carpenter. Will you kindly state what effect this is likely 

 to have on the vitality of the trees ? K C. P. 



St. Louis, Mo. 



[The appearance of American cities and towns is seri- 

 ously injured by the way in which ignorant and irre- 

 sponsible men are allowed, in so many cases, to mutilate 

 shade trees. Sometimes the cutting is done to satisfy the 

 unreasonable demands of the various corporations opera- 

 ting wires ; sometimes it is to gratify the whims of indi- 

 vidual property [owners. We can never hope that the 

 streets of our cities and towns will be ornamented with 

 handsome trees or properly protected from the summer 

 sun, as long as the governing bodies delegate their 

 authority to cut or prune trees to irresponsible agents of 

 private corporations, and allow individuals to hack down 

 every tree standing in a public thoroughfare which may 

 be disagreeable to them. In every city and town there 

 should be a responsible officer, familiar with trees and 

 their requirements, whose special duty should be the 

 planting and care of the street trees, and this officer 

 should superintend the planting of all such trees, and 

 their care and pruning, upon a system which should 

 secure the greatest benefit to the greatest number. Until 

 some plan like this is adopted, in accordance with popular 

 interest and popular demand, there is little use in giving 

 advice in cases like that in St. Louis, as described by our 

 correspondent Cutting off large branches from a healthy 

 tree reduces its vitality, and, of course, should never be 



permitted. Severe pruning may be resorted to when a 

 tree is in a feeble or perishing condition, when such an 

 operation may stimulate vigorous growth. A wound made 

 by cutting off a branch, unless it is immediately protected 

 by a coating of coal-tar or of paint, is liable to be attacked 

 with dry rot and other fungus-growth, and from the 

 affected surface, the decay will gradually penetrate the 

 whole tree and finally destroy it. It is merely a ques- 

 tion of time when trees subjected to the treatment de- 

 scribed by our correspondent must perish. There can, of 

 course, be but one opinion as to the appearance of a street 

 in which the trees are mutilated by the ordinary city 

 laborer. — Ed.] 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir. — In your issue of May 3d, 1888, you kindly inserted an 

 account of cases of inflammation of the skin of the hands and 

 face of a florist and some of his assistants, which was attri- 

 buted to the irritating action of some plant. Primula obconica, 

 the only one handled by them for the first time that season, 

 was held in especial suspicion as the possible offender. The 

 cutaneous disturbance therein described, dermatitis venenata, 

 subsided in a short time, and the skin of the three affected 

 persons has remained in a healthy condition until recently. 

 Within the last two or three weeks, however, they have all 

 manifested a recurrence of the same symptoms, an eczema- 

 tous inflammation of the hands and face, and in about the 

 same degree as last year. They now feel assured that the 

 trouble is caused by Primula obconica, for the condition did 

 not develop until a few days after this plant was first offered 

 for sale in the shop, where it was freely handled by them. 

 The proprietor informs me that his hands and face became 

 affected immediately after making it up into dinner-table deco- 

 rations. He states also that some of those engaged in cultivating 

 it have complained to him of a similar inflammation of the 

 skin, which it has produced upon them. His other assistants 

 in the shop, who were not thus affected last season, remain 

 exempt this year. 



It is desirable to know if other cultivators or florists have 

 had a similar experience with this newly-introduced plant, or 

 if other species of this large genus have exhibited irritating 

 properties. . 



Harvai-d Medical School, Boston. James L. White. 



Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir. — Will you kindly inform me whether Cypripedium 

 insigne is best propagated by seed or by division of the roots, 

 and v/hen the division should be made ? 



Plainfield, N. J. C. D. W. 



[Raising Orchids from seed is a work requiring great 

 skill and patience. The seeds are very fine, resembling chaffy 

 dust. Cypripedium msz^we is best propagated by dividing 

 the crowns after it has done flowering, and care should be 

 taken that each portion of the plant has some good roots 

 attached. Each division should have two or three 

 growths. — Ed.] 



Recent Publications. 



Contributions to American Botany, No. xvi., Sereno Watson. 

 Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 

 vol. xxiv., and now issued separately. 



Mr. Watson's sixteenth contribution to North American 

 Botany is mainly devoted to the enumeration of a collection of 

 plants made by Dr. Edward Palmer, in 1887, in the neigh- 

 borhood of Guaymas, in Mexico, at Muleje and Los Angeles 

 Bay, in Lower California, and on the island of San Pedro Mar- 

 tin, with descriptions of new species and critical notes. In the 

 short introduction to this paper Mr. Watson calls attention to 

 the fact that "the peninsula of Lower California and that portion 

 of the Mexican mainland which borders the intervening gulf, 

 though reputed a sterile land, have always, whenever they 

 have been explored, yielded a rich harvest of novelties to the 

 botanical collector. Much, therefore, was expected from so 

 keen and careful a collector as Dr. Palmer, when he under- 

 took to spend a season at Guaymas, and from that point to 

 explore such other places as might be accessible to him. 

 Though the season of 1887 proved very unfavorable on ac- 

 count of its dryness, the result has, nevertheless, been very 

 satisfactory. Of the 415 native species collected, eighty-nine 

 species— or more than one-fifth — are wholly new, and many 

 others are of great interest in various respects. 



"The larger part of the collection was made about Guaymas 



