THE DECIDUOUS CYPRESS IN ENGLAND 213 
feet—with the giants at Chapultepec and its Royal 
Gardens. We have no trees of this species that were 
alive and large in the golden age of Queen Elizabeth, 
when trees, which are still alive, were flourishing in 
Mexico in the reign of Montezuma. Our earliest 
trees hardly made appearance among us until nearly 
a century later, and the date of planting the champion 
trees at Syon, and Hounslow, and other places, seems 
to be yet another century on. 
We have no great dismal swamps dedicated to its 
growth, to foster its semi-aquatic nature. But if the 
tree is neither so old, large, or weird, in England, it 
must not be imagined that it is a dull dot, or has been, 
on our landscape scenes. If I were asked, if any 
one were asked, as a tree lover who had a nominal 
acquaintance with titles of trees, and a nodding ac- 
quaintance with the effects they produced by their 
colour, shape, and so forth, as to what tree it might 
be desirable to plant for the betterment of scenic 
effect, or what tree more than another had been 
deplorably neglected by the cultivator, and what tree 
in answer to such an inquiry has been upon the lips 
that reply in more exceeding times of number than 
any other, nearly all I think would unhesitatingly 
answer, the Deciduous Cypress. And let it not be 
forgotten that he— 
Who toils to leave as his bequest 
An added beauty to the earth, 
is worthy of grateful reminiscence. 
How many thousands of unoccupied sites upon the 
banks of the ever-concomitant lake, lakelet, pool, or 
streamlet of our England homes, great and small, 
are there, I wonder, that would not be improved 
beyond recognition by the planting of these stream- 
loving, peerless ornaments, with their radiant green 
