216 MANUAL OF GARDENING 
may give a very desirable temporary finish to places that are 
pretentious enough to make thern seem in keeping. 
Very rough, hard, sterile, and stony banks may sometimes 
be covered with coltsfoot (Tussilago Farfara), sacaline, Rubus 
crategifolius, comfrey, and various wild growths that persist in 
similar places in the neighborhood. 
However much the planter may plan for immediate effects, 
the beauty of trees and shrubs comes with maturity and age, 
and this beauty is often delayed, or even obliterated, by shear- 
ing and excessive heading-back. At first, bushes are stiff and 
erect, but when they attain their full character, they usually 
droop or roll over to meet the sward. Some bushes make 
mounds of green much sooner than others that may even be 
closely related. Thus the common yellow-bell (Forsythia vir- 
dissima) remains stiff and hard for some years, whereas F. 
suspensa makes a rolling heap of green in two or three years. 
Quick informal effects can also be secured by the use of Hall’s 
Japanese honeysuckle (Lonicera Halliana of nurserymen), an 
evergreen in the South, and holding its leaves until midwinter 
or later in the North. It may be used for covering a rock, a 
pile of rubbish, a stump (Fig. 236), to fill a corner against a 
foundation, or it may be trained on a porch or arbor. There 
is a form with yellow-veined leaves. Rosa Wichuraiana and 
some of the dewberries are useful for covering rough places. 
Many vines that are commonly used for porches and ‘ar- 
bors may be employed also for the borders of shrub-planta- 
tions and for covering rough banks and rocks, quickly giving a 
finish to the cruder parts of the place. Such vines, among 
others, are various kinds of clematis, Virginia creeper, actinidia, 
akebia, trumpet creeper, periploca, bitter-sweet (Solanum 
Dulcamara), wax-work (Celastrus scandens). 
Of course, very good immediate effects may be secured by 
very close planting (page 222), but the homesteader must not 
neglect to thin out these plantations when the time comes. 
