LANDSCAPE FORESTRY 229 



picturesque alone is concerned, nothing can be better than 

 the rough woodland road with its wheel tracks winding 

 in and out between the trees, or the well-trodden path, 

 which is invariably picturesquely crooked without going 

 unduly out of its way. An old oak or ash leaning across a 

 ride, or standing so close to its edge that its gnarled and 

 bulging roots project half-way across it, may be a fault in a 

 mind in which tidiness and formality amount to a disease, 

 but will never be objected to by the true lover of the 

 picturesque. 



Another pleasing effect is often produced by rows of trees 

 standing on either side of a straight ride, their tall clean 

 stems standing up like pillars of masonry, and forming a 

 beautiful vista from either end. Such woodland avenues 

 are far too few, although it takes many years before they 

 come to perfection. As examples of trees forming this kind 

 of avenue may be mentioned the beech at Savernake, the 

 cathedral firs at Lord Bathurst's, Cirencester, the lime 

 avenues in the grove at Longleat, the Spanish chestnut 

 avenue at Cowdray Park, Sussex, etc., while numerous double 

 avenues in parks, as well as those bounding many of the 

 green alleys of the formal style of gardening all over the 

 country, exhibit the same class of landscape forestry. 



Arkangement of Species. 



It has already been pointed out that the character of 

 a wood depends almost entirely upon the way in which 

 the different species which compose it are arranged. The 

 resthetic effect of a mixture of trees may be said to be of two 

 kinds — that which is due to their various tints, and density 

 of form or foliage ; and that dependent upon their character 

 generally, such as height, fulness of crown, straightness and 

 cleanliness of stem, and capacity for growing in dense or 

 open masses. The former of these effects is of most im- 

 portance on the margins of plantations, or in small clumps 

 which have been planted, or are maintained, to produce 

 masses of foliage. In such cases the judicious mixture of 

 different species of hardwoods has a fine effect, when light- 



