266 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 224. 



the Sassafras, the sturdy unfolding buds of tlie Hickories, the 

 red tints spread over the leaves of the wild Cherries, the beauty 

 of the vernal Hornbeam and Hop Hornbeam, of the late- 

 flowering- Maples, of the Ashes, the Locusts, the Elms and 

 the Hackberry, or of the conifers of which each species 

 signals the return of summer in its peculiar way. A volume 

 might well be written on the vernal characters and beauties 

 of the trees of eastern America, but all vv'e can hope to do 

 now is to point out a woodland path, where there is much 

 to be seen and many things to learn for the man who 

 knows how to see, in the belief that he who does not know 

 trees in spring and has not \\'atched the early stages of 

 their yearly growth has lost one of the best pleasures of 

 life and missed one of the benefits which we Americans 

 have in li\ing in a country of such varied, interesting and 

 beautiful forests that the forests of all other temperate 

 lands are in comparison tame and uninteresting. 



A WRITER in Tlie London Field discussing the attempts 

 which have been made in recent years to introduce bulbous 

 plants into the grassy slopes of the Royal Gardens at Kew, 

 sensibly calls attention to the fact that, "in such a vast 

 garden there are many opportunities of carrying out this 

 excellent system, particularly where the branches of trees 

 touch the ground. In every one of such cases some of 

 the delightful early flowers might be in position, the shel- 

 tered ground around such trees being exactly what many 

 bulbs delight in. Hitherto use has been made of popular 

 flowers well known in gardens, but this system may en- 

 able us to use with effect beautiful flowers that have not 

 been generally considered worthy of cultivation in gar- 

 dens — flowers which perhaps looked at in the hand are not 

 so attractive as Lilies or Daffodils, but which might furnish 

 new effects when seen in quantity. We mean such floweirs 

 as the less showy sorts of the Star of Bethlehem, Gazea, 

 and even Allium, Fritillaria, European Gladioli, Grape Hya- 

 cinths, which we find thrive freely in grass, and the species 

 of wild Tulip which are rarely seen in all their force of 

 color, and also some of the beautiful and less showy spring 

 flowers which might be used more freely, such as the Snow- 

 flake, principally the spring variety ; St. Bruno's Lily in the 

 rich grass is delightful, and the Dog-tooth Violet, which 

 thrives in grass, and which, however dwarfed and starved, 

 is always beautiful. The contrast between short turf and the 

 waving grass full of flowers will be delightful. In the hot 

 days of spring, flowers so often pass quickly awa)^ that it 

 is a great advantage not to have to disturb the whole gar- 

 den for them, whereas in the grass they are not in the wa);-, 

 and in the wild garden one bulb may succeed another, 

 which is not so easy in- the regular garden." 



Certainly there is no more delightful form of gardening 

 than this, or one which can be more easily executed if 

 proper care is taken in selecting the plants to be 

 used and in planting them. The essential thing in wild- 

 gardening is the selection of the plants. These must look 

 as if they were or might be wild, that is, they must har- 

 monize with their surroundings. A stately garden Tulip 

 or a monstrous garden Hyacinth looks out of place if it 

 is seen by a wild wood-walk or in a field of waving 

 grass, just as a great double-flowered Pteony looks out of 

 place anywhere but in a garden-border. For natural plant- 

 ing, wild forms, or forms which have suffered little change 

 by cultivation, are essential, although it is perhaps our as- 

 sociation of such garden-plants with trim beds or borders 

 rather than any inherent unfitness in the plants them- 

 selves that makes them appear out of place outside the 

 garden proper. 



Grass must be cut even by the borders of the wood- 

 walk, although the operation may be delayed perhaps 

 until July, so that it is necessary to select plants 

 to plant in the grass that ripen their foliage early 

 in the season, unless it is proposed to. replant them 

 every year. The Snowdrop, and the Crocus, especially 

 white and yellow flowered varieties, can be used to advan- 



tage in this way. All the Narcissi look well in the grass, 

 and ripen their foliage early, although the Poet's Narcissus 

 appears to thrive in grass better than any of the yellow- 

 flowered varieties, and is perhaps the best of all plants to 

 use in this way. With it will bloom the Blue Bell or Wild 

 Hyacinth (Scilla nutans), a charming plant with flowers 

 which are sometimes pink or white as well as bright blue. 

 Some of the small-flowered wild Tulips, likeTulipa Persica, 

 look well in the grass, as does the Star of Bethlehem, 

 which has become naturalized in some parts of the coun- 

 try, and the Grape Hyacinth. All the Buttercups are beau- 

 tiful in the grass, and so are our native Iris if the ground is 

 moist enough to insure their vigorous growth. The list of 

 plants, however, which can be used in this way is not a 

 very long one, although among our native plants there are 

 probably a few that can be seen to their best advantage in 

 this way, and we recall a bank from which the grass is cut 

 every year in June for hay, on which the Cuckoo-flower 

 (Cardamine pratensis) has held its own for years, and 

 gradually spread over such an area that now its lovely pale 

 lilac flowers make a brave show as they gradually unfold 

 during the last two weeks of May. 



Practical Forestry. 



THE following account of an experiment in growing 

 White Pines in Durham, New Hampshire, by the 

 Hon. John D. Lyman, of Exeter, appeared in a recent 

 number of The American Cultivator : 



In the year 1870 I purchased the abandoned Pike Farm. 

 Some two or three years afterward I noticed about an acre of 

 little Pines growing very thickly upon the land. In their con- 

 dition at that time they had no market value. Mr. I. P. Berry, 

 the treasurer of Strafford County, who thinned these trees for 

 me, said that the acre of land with the little Pines would not then 

 have sold for $3.00. The process of thinning out was com- 

 menced about eighteen years ag^o, and has been continued 

 at various times since, but the growth has never been suffi- 

 ciently thinned, and even now numbers 178 trees. I think 

 there should not be over 100 trees at this stage of growth. 



For the purpose of thinning I recently cut one of the small- 

 est, most crowded and oldest trees. This tree had once lost 

 its main top, which, of course, checked its growth for several 

 years, and it has been so much crowded that during the past ten 

 years its growth has been very slow. Yet this tree was seventy- 

 seven and a half feet in height, measured thirteen inches 

 across its stump, and nineteen inches in circumference fifty- 

 seven feet from the ground. I measured the circumference of 

 the trees four feet from the ground, standing nearest a straight 

 line drawn through the centre of the lot, and found the average 

 to be a little over forty inches. One tree standing on the edge, 

 and not included in those which averaged forty inches in cir- 

 cumference, girded seventy-four inches four feet from the 

 ground. This one, of course, is " limby " on the side toward 

 tlie cleared land. 



As these Pines came up very thickly, they had no large, 

 low limbs. Their small limbs died for quite a distance 

 from the ground. Several years ago I removed these dead 

 limbs, leaving none within about twelve feet of the ground. 

 Not being able to secure a suitable saw in Boston, I had one 

 made from a wood-saw, and at an outlay of about three cents 

 a tree I have lately had these dead limbs taken off, say eighteen 

 or twenty feet from the ground. My object is not to promote 

 growth, but to prevent loose, black knots in the boards. I 

 presume it is generally known that while the Pine-limb is alive 

 the knot is of a reddish hue and secured fast to the wood, but 

 after the limb dies the annual growth of the trunk pushes out 

 over the dead limb, and this part of the knot is black and 

 often so loose as to fall out and leave a hole in the board when 

 sawed from the log. The difference in value between clear 

 pine boards and those abounding in knots, and especially in 

 fjlack, loose knots and knot-holes, is well understood by those 

 who buy and sell lumber. In my experiments I am attempting 

 to grow good lumber, instead of knotty, cheap lumber. 



The greatest number of rings (these generally correctly 

 indicate the age of the tree) which I have ever found in any 

 Pine in the clump of which I am writing was forty-five. This 

 number of rings I found in the tree lately cut. As its height 

 was seventy-seven and one-half feet, the annual gain in height 

 was twenty and two-thirds inches, presuming the tree to be 

 forty-five years of age. 



