December lg, 1894.] 



Garden and Forest. 



501 



GARDEN AND FOREST. 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY 



THE GARDEN AND FOREST PUBLISHING CO. 



Office: Tribune Building, New York. 



Conducted by Professor C. S. Sargent. 



ENTERED AS SECOND CLASS MATTER AT THE POST-OFFICE AT NEW YORK, N. 



NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 19, 1894. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 



Editorial Articles '.—Deciduous Trees in Winter 501 



Donations of Park Land 501 



The Cottonwood tor Forest planting on the Plains, 



Professor Charles A. Kejfer. 502 



So-called Florida Sea Means. (With figure.) Charles H. Coe. 502 



New or Little-known Plants :— The Muskeag Spruce. (With figure.) 



H. B. Ayres. 504 



Plant Notes 5"5 



Cultural Department : -Achimenes — II IK E. Endicott. 506 



Greenhouse Work E. O. Or/,,/ 507 



Cyclamens " 'illiam Seott. 507 



Syraying tor Black-knot upon Cherries and Plums /■'. G. Lodeman. 50S 



Correspondence :— Pearson's Ironclad Grape I W. Pearson. 509 



Recent Publications 509 



Notes .... 510 



Illustrations:— Florida Sea Beans, Fig 79 503 



Upland form of Muskeag Spruce, Fig 80 : . . 505 



Deciduous Trees in Winter. 



PERHAPS the primary notion conveyed to most minds 

 by the word "tree" is that of a mass of foliage, and 

 yet in this climate by far the larger proportion of our trees 

 are leafless for six months every year. It is far from being 

 true, however, that trees are stripped of their attractive- 

 ness when their leaves fall. Indeed, a good argument 

 could be made to prove that trees with deciduous leaves 

 are more beautiful as a class, taking the season through, 

 than coniferous or even broad-leaved evergreen trees. 

 There is a certain monotony in the look of trees with per- 

 sistent foliage which one would hesitate to pronounce 

 tiresome, but certainly a livelier interest is excited by trees 

 which pass through a series of striking transformations 

 from month to month as the soft colors of the bursting 

 leaves in spring develop into the green luxuriance of 

 summer, which in its turn gives place to the glowing tints 

 of autumn. All these changes give a diversity and anima- 

 tion which is not possible to any evergreen tree. Even the 

 falling of the leaves only uncovers beauties which they 

 had concealed — beauty in structural symmetry of the sup- 

 porting trunk and limbs, beauty in the graceful disposi- 

 tion of the smaller branches, and beauty of form and 

 texture and color in every detail. 



Indeed, it is only when the tree is stripped naked that 

 we can see the reasons for its characteristic beauty when 

 in full leaf. Next to their general outline the most marked 

 distinction between trees in summer is found in the way 

 their foliage breaks into areas of light and shade. The 

 Oak, with its deep shadows contrasting strongly with the 

 masses of leaves which stand out boldly to catch all the 

 light, and the smooth sunny surface of a young Maple, 

 where the alternating spaces of light and shadow are smaller 

 and more numerous, may be cited as two specially distinct 

 types of trees. But the structural reason for this super- 

 ficial difference is readily seen in winter. The massive 

 trunk of the Oak separates into a few large branches, and 

 these leave deep cavernous openings for heavy shadows 

 in the foliage which are not possible in the Maple, with 

 its skeleton of numerous slender branches radiating at a 

 uniform ansrle from the central stem. It is not, therefore, 



the covering of leaves, but the framework of the tree, 

 which determines not only its general contour but fixes its 

 expression, whether of cheerfulness or gloom, of dignity 

 or grace. 



But it is not only the general structure of trees that 

 makes them worth studying in winter. There are distinc- 

 tive beauties of detail in every leafless tree which give it 

 an individual interest. The bark may be as smooth and 

 fine-grained as it is in the Beech or Hornbeam, or it may be 

 ridged and furrowed, or plated over with protective scales, 

 but it is always interesting, and the browns and russets and 

 grays of its large limbs have a richness of color which is 

 peculiarly their own, while the tracery which the slender 

 branchlets make against the sky is a revelation of delicacy 

 and grace which is never seen until the trees are bare. 

 The columnar strength of the great trunks with the beauty 

 of their weather-worn and lichen-stained bark is never so 

 manifest as when they rise darkly above a glittering car- 

 pet of snow, while the lace-like grace of the spray is 

 brought out with charming distinctness by the purity and 

 brilliancy of the winter sky beyond. Indeed, the fullness 

 and clearness of the light in frosty weather give an added 

 charm to every element of the landscape, and the bare trees 

 when bathed in it acquire a new and indescribable beauty. 

 Then there are winter days when some special atmospheric 

 conditions quite transfigure the trees and present them to 

 the eye as new creations. They may be white as ala- 

 baster on their stormy side when the clamp snow clings to 

 trunk and limb ; or every twig may sparkle in a fleece of 

 hoar-frost ; or all the trees in a broad landscape may be cased 

 in polished silver, with every branch arching under its 

 burden of transparent ice. In fact, the winter aspect 

 of trees is no less varied than their appearance in full leaf, 

 so that to one who habitually observes them merely as 

 beautiful natural objects, as truly as to the systematic 

 student of botany who takes note of their winter buds and 

 other distinguishing characteristics, no dull season ever 

 comes. 



In most of our older cities where there is anything like an 

 adequate supply of public parks, this result has been due to 

 the self-denying labors of a few forward-looking men. 

 Thirty years ago there was nothing like a popular appre- 

 ciation of the value of recreation-grounds to a city, and, 

 therefore, no urgent demand for them, but in every case 

 one or two unselfish workers have taken the cause to heart 

 and labored untiringly to arouse the slothful public to a 

 sense of what was needed. These men encountered dis- 

 couragements at every step in the apathy of their hearers, 

 and in the stolid resistance of town authorities to what seemed 

 to them unremunerative outlay, and yet they persisted, 

 and some of them are still living to see their prophecies 

 become fact and all their arguments more than vindicated. 

 They worked for no reward, but it seems to be an injustice 

 that these early educators of public opinion, who had, in 

 the first place, to create the taste they wished to gratify, 

 have received so little recognition. It is not creditable to 

 this city that among the so-called works of art in Central 

 Park there is no statue to Downing, and in many other 

 cities there is not even a tablet within their park gates to 

 commemorate the self-denying efforts of their real origina- 

 tors — men 'whose very names can only be ascertained by 

 searching through the early park reports, and even here 

 they too often receive but scanty mention. 



But there is another service connected with parks which 

 men of wealth can render. Tin' city of Hartford seem- to 

 be conspicuously fortunate in having received from three 

 different citizens within a short time very considerable 

 areas of land to be devoted to public use. Munificent gifts 

 for similar purposes have be made before, but men who 

 have wished to make some civic endowment have usually 

 chosen to do it in some other way. In almost till of our 

 important cities public-spirited men have founded librai 

 hospitals, galleries of art and museums of various sorts, 

 while comparatively few parks or grounds have thus 



