EEPORT OF ARCHITECT OF UNITED STATES CAPITOL. 11 



ml scenery appropriate to be associated with a national seat of learning, and was 

 regarded by him as the first step in a scheme of planting to be extended in one con- 

 nected design to the While House and the Potomac. Upon Downing's untimely death. 

 in 1852, the larger design was suspended, gradually lost sight of, and the ground has 

 since been in considerable part laid out under successive acts of Congress by parcels, 

 with a variety of local motives, none of which have as yet been fully realized. As to 

 that actually planted under Downing's instructions, those to whom Le gave them soon 

 dropped off; neglect and ill-usage followed; it is in parts stuffy and crowded, and in 

 others run down and poverty-stricken, but in no other planted ground near Washing- 

 ton is there, or does there promise to be, any tree beauty to compare with what has 

 been already attained in it. 



Under its shades government has allowed a modest memorial of the artist to be 

 placed by private subscription. Nowhere will a monument be found commemorating 

 a riper fruit of the Republic, more honorable aspirations, or devotion to a higher stand- 

 ard of patriotic duty. 



Near the Agricultural ground there is an interesting collection of hardy aquatic 

 plants in the inclosure of the Government Fish Commission, and in adjoining build- 

 ings of the Smithsonian Institution and National Museum there are collections of woods 

 and of tree products and of fossil woods and plants. 



The public streets of Washington have been planted, mainly between 1870 and 1880, 

 with upwards of fifty thousand (56,000) trees of twenty different sorts. A list showing 

 where rows of each may be observed can be found in the report of the Parking Com- 

 mission. Though a considerable proportion are of quick-growing kinds, to which 

 most experts object as too straggling in mature habit, too fragile, liable to accident, 

 and short-lived, and though the amount and quality of soil provided is seldom ade- 

 quate to a long-continued vigorous growth, the work on the whole is the best and most 

 instructive example of town-planting to be seen on the continent. If well followed 

 up in the care of the trees, the results will give Washington a distinction among the 

 capital towns ot the world — a distinction original, representative, and historic ; na- 

 tural, racy of the soil, congenial with the climate, in unquestionable good taste, in- 

 disputably excellent and admirable ; little of which can be claimed of the results of 

 most outlays that have been made by government for the improvement of the city. 



The work thus far has been done with even over-strained economy, under the un- 

 broken superintendence of three professional tree- masters, William R. Smith, curator 

 of the Botanic Garden, William Saunders, of the Agricultural Tree Collection, and 

 John Saul, who, under Downing, thirty years ago, planted the Smithsonian Park, of 

 either of whom information may be obtained, and to whom thanks for a service to the 

 nation, as yet too little appreciated, may well be given. 



In the woods of natural growth about Washington, many sorts of trees may be found 

 that are not indigenous in the extreme north. Among them there is the Liquid Amber 

 or Sweet Gum (L. siyracijiua) : the Willow Oak (Quercus Phellos); th'e Laurel Oak 

 (Quercns imbricaria) : the Persimmou (Diospyros Virginiana) ; the American Holly (Ilex 

 opaca): the Black Walnut (Inglans nigra); the Swamp Magnolia (M, glanca); the Red 

 Birch (Betula nigra), (a strikingly rustic beauty of extreme grace, as commonly observed 

 on water banks hereabouts); and the Catalpa (C. bignonioides). 



The first two may be fouud in low grounds, often in association with the Tupelo or 

 Sour Gum (Nyssa multiflora) ; the White Ash (Fraxinus Americana); the Scarlet Maple 

 (Acer rubrum) ; the Scarlet Oak (Q. coccinea) ; the Sassafras (S. officinale), which, rarely 

 seen except as a shrub in the far north, is here a stout and lofty tree, richly furnished, 

 very sportive in its forms of foliage, and often excelling all other deciduous trees in 

 picturesqueness; and the Dogwood (Comus florida), growing with a dense spreading 

 head to a height of thirty feet. These, with other cornels, several of the shrubby 

 sumacs (films), the Climbing Sumac (B. toxicodendron), Bitter Sweet (Celaslrus scan- 

 dew), and Virginia Creeper (Ampelop.iis quinquefolia), all being remarkable for their 

 autumnal tints, and each in a different way, form combinations novel and delightful to 

 the northern eye. In a favorable season, near the fall of the leaf, visitors from over 

 sea will nowhere find a more gorgeous sylvan spectacle than is thus presented within 

 a mile of the city, and this without a stroke of intentional aid from any human hand. 

 The effect is often augmented by lower growths than any that have been named, as of 

 huckleberries and brambles, by bright fruits and haws, and by golden and purple 

 blooms of herbaceous plants. 



Of trees to which European's may like to have their attention directed, in addition 

 to those already named, there are growing wild, and of frequent occurrence, two 

 American Elms ; the Black Cherry {Primus scrotina), different examples of which 

 vary much, but often a remarkably elegant and graceful tree, near Washington ; the 

 America* Beech (Fagns ferrnginia), a neater and more delicate tree than the Euro- 

 pean : the Tulip (Liriodendron tulipifua), growing to great height and in perfection; 

 the Chestnut (Castanea vesca Americana), always, when well grown, a noble tree, but 

 when early in June in bloom, the most glorious object of our woods; the Hickories 

 ' Carga) : the Butternut (Inglans einerea) ; and eighteen (indigenous) sorts of oaks, at 



