Decem ber 23, 1891.] 



Garden and Forest. 



601 



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. Y. 



NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1891. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 



Euitorial Articles :— Hemlocks in Winter. (With figure) 601 



Shaw School of Botany, in Saint Louis 601 



New England Parks Mrs. J. H. Robbins. 602 



Notes of a Summer Journey in Europe. — II J. G. Jack. 603 



The Weeds of California.— VI '. Professor E. W. Hilgard. 604 



Plant Notes: — Cypripedium reticulatum. (With figures.) A. D. 605 



Cultural Department : — Sowing Seed % N. Gerard. 605 



Rose Notes W. H. Taplin. 606 



Better Begonias Wanted IV. E. Endicott. 606 



Gall-worms Injuring the Roses Professor Byron D. Halsted. 608 



Notes from the Harvard Botanic Garden M. Barker. 608 



Calanthes W. S. 609 



The Forest : — The Subjection of Toirents by Reforestation of Mountains. — III. 



M. P. Demontzey. 609 



Correspondence : — Botanical Exhibition of the Appalachian Club, 



Edward L. Rand. 610 



The Acorn Crop near Chicago E. J. Hill. 610 



Uncommon Varieties of Apples N. D. 611 



Recent Publications 611 



Notes 611 



Illustrations: — Cypripedium reticulatum. The Plant, Fig. 93 605 



Cypripedium reticulatum. The Flower, Fig. 96 605 



A Hemlock Grove in Winter, Fig. 97 607 



Hemlocks in Winter. 



IN our northern climate, with its long- and often rigorous 

 winters, the sight of evergreens is a comfort and de- 

 light. Their soft green masses seem to mitigate the sever- 

 ity of the season, and to temper the bitter blast. This the 

 aborigines well understood, and in the depths of the forest 

 the Indian built his winter camp, securely sheltered from 

 the searching winds, which are the unendurable part of 

 that tempestuous portion of the year. 



Goodly is an assemblage of Firs and Spruces when skies 

 lower and tempests howl, comfortable the aspect of a Pine 

 wood, with its furry branches and brown carpet, when the 

 bare twigs of deciduous trees are shivering in the north- 

 west wind ; but more impressive than all is the sight of a 

 group, or forest, of Hemlocks, such as is depicted on page 

 607, with their bending boughs laden with snow, and their 

 graceful forms emphasized by their regal border of ermine. 



Growing, as they best love to grow, on a rocky north- 

 ern slope, their majestic height is enhanced by the eleva- 

 tion on which they stand ; their columnar trunks catch the 

 light from above upon their snow-besprinkled bark, till the 

 whole forest seems a Gothic cathedral, marble-roofed and 

 pillared, with wild fret-work and intricate design of shaft 

 and capital, cornice and rafter, buttress and corbel, sculp- 

 tured like a shrine with fantastic forms, and built into a 

 quaint wonderful series of aisle and nave, chapel and 

 sanctuary. 



To walk here gives a strange and solemn delight ; the 

 gray rocks take on grotesque forms in their white sheath- 

 ing, the ground is like a mosaic floor beneath the feet, the 

 winter birds chatter in the branches overhead, the great 

 trunks, with their rough bark, show a rich hue amid all 

 this whiteness. A snow-shower greets the traveler from 

 the light branches stirred by the approach of man as he 

 advances through the solitary wood. No wind reaches the 

 sheltered region, but in the high snow-laden tops there is 



a murmur, the voice of the forest, the diapason of creak- 

 ing bough, and sigh of stirring foliage shaking off its bur- 

 den. New and lovely forms greet the beholder as he 

 strays in this trackless wilderness, where the Indian of 

 yore found protection and warmth for his wigwam built 

 of the red-brown bark. The thought strays back to that 

 time before the white man penetrated these wilds to drive 

 the sachem and the squaw from their happy hunting- 

 grounds, and he would gladly give a voice to the old trees to 

 tell their story and recall the past, singing in runic rhyme 

 some strange, wild legend of an older savage day. What 

 more mysterious than the forest? What voice more vaguely 

 impressive than its confused complaint? What poet may 

 catch the echo of this melody and weave it into verse ? To 

 wander in a Hemlock wood is to commune with Nature, 

 to listen to an unknown tongue, to struggle with the secret 

 of the unspeaking trees, which suggest questions forever to 

 man, but never reply, nor share with him their experience. 



A single Hemlock, standing alone, with every curving 

 line ridged with snow, through which the feathery green 

 shines darkly, is a fair sight, a Christmas emblem, a tree 

 of beauty. When the sun shines and the snow melts, a 

 faint aromatic fragrance emanates from the dripping foli- 

 age, as if the tree were burning incense. This delicate 

 perfume, full of soft suggestion, completes the charm of 

 this wonderful tree, precious alike for nobleness of shaft 

 and grace of branch and leafage, seeming forever to as- 

 sociate it in one's mind with that dear holiday of child- 

 hood, which is the solemn festival of maturity. 



For the Hemlock is, above all, the Christmas-tree. Its 

 perfume, whenever we inhale it, brings to our minds, not 

 only a vision of the green wood, but a thought of dim 

 and quiet churches wreathed with its boughs, of a deep 

 chancel embowered in its branches, of joyous hymns 

 from white-robed choristers, of the great angelic chorus, 



Gloria in Excelsis Domino, 



with which Christmas Day first dawned upon a waiting 

 earth, and which echoes still in solemn chant of earthly 

 voices from cloister and cathedral, from chapel and fire- 

 side, as year by year the happy day returns, on which 

 we wreathe about the Christmas altar and the Christmas 

 hearth the Hemlock-bough to give forth the sweet in- 

 cense of its fragrance. 



Then a vision of joyous little ones dancing around its 

 gayly lighted form succeeds the solemn suggestion of its 

 holy service, and our careless youth returns in memory, 

 cheery and full of hope, or in maturer age we rejoice in 

 the pleasure of our children and our grandchildren, as we 

 gaze indulgently upon their frolicsome glee around this 

 bearer of precious burdens. 



So must this stately and beautiful Hemlock ever come 

 near to our hearts, twined as it is with thoughts of praise 

 and of generous giving ; and with its undying verdure, its 

 wide-spread, kindly shelter, its solemn loveliness, its breath 

 of praise, it is a fitting emblem of the season with which 

 it must ever be associated in our thoughts — the blessed 

 Christmas-tide. 



A few weeks ago we published the announcement of 

 Professor Trelease concerning the examination of candi- 

 dates for garden pupils at the Shaw School of Botany, in 

 Saint Louis. It will be remembered that there are six 

 scholarships in this institution, where young men can re- 

 ceive theoretical instruction in botany, horticulture, eco- 

 nomic entomology, and enough of land-surveying and 

 book-keeping to equip one to take charge of a large estate. 

 The aim, however, of these scholarships is not to make 

 botanists or entomologists, but gardeners ; and as the only 

 way to learn garden practice is by the practice of garden- 

 ing, these young men will be employed in the work of the 

 different parts of the establishment and receive pay for the 

 same, besides having comfortable lodgings near at hand 

 and free tuition. The pupil is expected here to learn the 

 practice of small-fruit culture, orchard culture, forestry, 



