February 29, 18S8. 



Garden and Forest. 



GARDEN AND FOREST. 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY 



THE GARDEN AND FOREST PUBLISHING CO. 



[LIMITED.] 



Office ; Tribune Building, New York. 



Conducted by . 





. . Professor C. 



S. Sargent. 



ENTERED AS SECOND-CLASS MATTER AT THE 



POST OFFICE AT NEW YORK, N. Y. 



NEW YORK, 



WEDNESDAY, 



FEBRUARY 



29, 



1888. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



Editorial Articles: — Asa Gray. Tiie Gardener's Monthly. T!ie White 

 Pine in Europe ' ." 



The Forests of the White Mountains Francis Parkman. 



Landscape Gardening.— A Definition Mrs. Schuyler Vein Rensselaer. 



Floriculture in the United States Peter Henderson. 



How to Make a Lawn Professor W. J. Heal 



Letter from London ;;.-. Coldrtng. 



A New Departure in Clirysanthemums A. H. Few/ces. 



New Plants fj-om Afghanistan Max Lclchtlnt 



Iris Tenuis with fisjure ".'.'.'.'.Serena Watson. 



Hardy Shrubs tor Forcing ;.;--,„. Falconer. 



Plant Notes. . . . C.G. Pringle : Professor IK Trelcase. 



Wire Netting for 1 ree (_Tuards A. A. Cr-ozier 



Artificial Water, with Illusti-ation 



Some New Roses... ^ ' S^.'.'.'.'.'Edwin'Unsiale. 



1 wo Ferns and Their Treatment p, Coldrlng. 



Timely Hints about Bulbs y„/,„ Thorpe. 



Entomology ; 



Arsenical Poisons in the Orchard Professor A. S. Packard. 



The Forest ; 



The White Pine in Europe Professor H. .Mayr. 



European Larch in Massachusetts 



Thinning Pine Plantations ".'. .'.'b 'e 'F-rn'o'ty 



Book Reviews : 



Gray's Elements of Botany Professor G. L. Coodale. 



Kansas Forest Trees Professor G. L. Goojale. 



Public Works :— The Fallsof Minnehaha— A Pari; for Wilmington 



Flower Markets ;— New York— Philadelphia— Boston 



Asa Gray. 



THE whole civilizeti world is mourning the death of 

 Asa Gray with a depth of feeling and appreciation 

 perhaps never accorded before to a scholar and man of 

 science. 



To the editors of this Journal the loss at the very out- 

 set of their labors is serious indeed. They lose a wise and 

 sympathetic adviser of great experience and mature judg- 

 ment to whom they could always have turned with entire 

 freedom and in perfect confidence ; and they lose a contribu- 

 tor whose vast stores of knowledge and graceful pen mio-ht, 

 it was reasonable to hope, have long enriched their col- 

 umns. 



The career of Asa Gray is interesting from many points 

 of view. It is the story of the life of a man born in humble 

 circumstances, without the advantages of early education 

 without inherited genius— for there is no trace in his yeo- 

 man ancestry of any germ of intellectual greatness— who 

 succeeded m gaining through native intelligence, industry 

 and force of character, a position in the NQry front rank of the 

 scientific men of his age. Among the naturalists who since 

 Linnaeus, have devoted their lives to the description and 

 classification of plants, four or five stand out prominently 

 in the character and importance of their work. In this 

 Jittle group Asa Gray has fairly won for himself a lastino- 

 position. But he was something more than a mere syste"^ 

 matist. He showed himself capable of drawing broad 

 philosophical conclusions from the dry facts he collected 

 and elaborated with such untiring industry and zeal This 

 power of comprehensive generalization he showed in his 

 paper upon the "Characters of Certain New Species of Plants 

 Collected m Japan" by Charles Wright, published nearly 

 thirty years ago. Here he f^rst pointed out the extraordinary 

 similarity between the Floras of Eastern North America 

 and Japan, and then explained the peculiar distribution of 

 plants through the northern hemisphere by tracino- their 



direct descent through geological eras from ancestors 

 which flourished in the arctic regions down to the latest 

 tertiary period. This paper was Professor Gray's most 

 remarkable and interesting contribution to science. It 

 at once raised him to high rank among philosophical 

 naturalists and drew the attention of the whole scientific 

 world to the Cambridge botanist. 



Asa Gray did not devote himself to abstract science 

 alone ; he wrote as successfully for the student as for 

 the professional naturalist. His long list of educational 

 works have no equals in accuracy and in beauty and 

 compactness of expression. They have had a remarkable 

 influence upon the study of botany in this country during 

 the half century which has elapsed since the first of the 

 series appeared. 



Botany, moreover, did not satisfy that wonderful intellect, 

 which hard work only stimulated but did not weary, and 

 one of Asa Gray's chief claims to distinction is the promi- 

 nent and commanding position he took in the great intel- 

 lectual and scientific struggle of modern times, in which, 

 almost alone and single handed he bore in America the 

 brunt of the disbelief in the Darwinian theory shared by 

 most of the leading naturalists of the time. 



But the crowning labor of Asa Gray's life was the 

 preparation of a descriptive work upon the plants of North 

 America. This great undertaking occupied his attention 

 and much of his time during the last forty years of his life. 

 Less fortunate than his greatest botanical contemporary, 

 George Bentham, who turned from the last page of 

 corrected proof of his work upon the genera of plants to 

 the bed from which he was never to rise again, Asa Gray's 

 great work is left unfinished. The two volumes of the 

 "Synoptical Flora of North America" will keep his 

 memory green, however, as long as the human race is 

 interested in the study of plants. 



But his botanical writings and his scientific fame are not 

 the most valuable legacy which Asa Gray has left to the 

 American people. More precious to us is the example of 

 his life in this age of grasping materialism. It is a life that 

 teaches how industry and unselfish devotion to learning 

 can attain to the highest distinction and the most enduring 

 fame. Great as were his intellectual gifts, Asa Gray was 

 greatest in the simplicity of his character and in the beauty 

 of his pure and stainless life. 



It is with genuine regret that we read the announcement 

 of the discontinuance of the Gardefier s Monthly. It is like 

 reading of the death of an old friend. Ever since we have 

 been interested in the cultivation of flowers we have 

 looked to the Monthly for inspiration and advice, and its 

 pages have rarely been turned without finding the assist- 

 ance we stood in need of But, fortunately, the Gardener's 

 Monthly, and its modest and accomplished editor, Mr. 

 Thomas Meehan, were one and the same thing. It is Mr. 

 Meehan's long editorial experience, high character, great 

 learning and varied practical knowledge, which made the 

 Gardeners Monthly what it was. These, we are happy to 

 know, are not to be lost to us, as Mr. Meehan will, in a some- 

 what different field and with new associates, continue to 

 delight and instruct the horticultural public. 



Americans who visit Europe cannot fail to remark that 

 in the parks and pleasure grounds of the Continent no 

 coniferous tree is more graceful when young or more dig- 

 nified at maturity than our White Pine. The notes of Dr. 

 Mayr, of the Bavarian Forest Academy, in another column. ■ 

 testify that it holds a position of equal importance as a forest 

 tree for economic planting. It thrives from Northern Ger- 

 many to Lombardy, corresponding with a range of climate 

 in this country from New England to Northern Georgia. It 

 needs bright sunshine, however, and perhaps it is for lack of 

 this that so few good specimens are seen in England. It was 

 among the first of our trees to be introduced there, but it 

 has been universally pronounced an indifferent grower. 



