DESOEIPTIVE ENUMERATION OF TREES. 117 



A second source of tliat contempt in wHcli tlie 

 Scotcli Eir is commonly held, is our rarely seeing 

 it in a picturesque state. Scotcli Firs are seldom 

 planted as single trees, or in a judicious group ; but 

 generally in close, compact bodies, in thick array, 

 •wliicli suffocates or cramps them, and if they ever 

 get loose from this bondage, they are already 

 ruined. Their lateral branches are gone, and 

 their stems are drawn into poles, on which their 

 heads appear stuck as on a centre. Whereas if 

 the tree had grown in its natural state, all mis- 

 chief had been prevented. Its stem would have 

 taken an easy sweep, and its lateral branches, 

 which naturally grow with as much beaiitiful 

 irregularity as those of deciduous trees, would 

 have hung loosely and negligently ; and the more 

 so, as there is something pecidiarly light and 

 feathery in its foliage. I mean not to assert that 

 every Scotch Fir, though in a natural state, would 

 possess these beauties ; but it would at least have 

 the chance of other trees, and I have seen it, 

 though indeed but rarely, in such a state as to 

 equal in beauty the most elegant Stone Pine. 



All trees, indeed, crowded together, naturally 



