8 TREES AND SHRUBS 



to supply artificially a good soil and a little extra water to 

 plants from our mountains than to do the same thing for 

 eastern plants and at the same time try to protect them from 

 our sun, cur frosts, our wind, and our dry atmosphere? Which 

 procedure s the more likely to result favorably? 



Wou. ' it not be saner to recognize the fact that the con- 

 ditions o: a semi-arid region are fundamentally different 

 from thos of a humid one and adapt our stlyes of architec- 

 ture and 1 ndscape gardening to the region instead of trying 

 to introduce those of an entirely different one? The funda- 

 mental principle of all such effort is to make the artificial 

 structures fit the lines and demands of the natural surround- 

 ings and arrange all vegetation so as to carry out the general 

 natural scheme of the region whether it be formal gardening 

 or not. Of course the native vegetation lends itself to this 

 method ar i is most effective. 



Then there are situations in which it is desirable to have 

 some vegetation where only a limited supply of water is to be 

 had at any time. In such locations some of the typical arid 

 region plants would be thoroughly at home. While they 

 may not be everything that is desirable, they are certainly 

 much better than none, and no others are able to stand such a 

 severe environment. 



To me there is an appeal to "the eternal fitness of things" 

 in our native vegetation. It seems at home, a part of the coun- 

 try, and as thoroughly appropriate and in place as an adobe 

 house is in this sun-blest land of ours. This adaptation to 

 environment is so marked in some of the trees and shrubs 

 that, though flat-leaved and of deciduous ancestry, they are 

 nevertheless evergreen and are thus rendered all the more val- 

 uable for ornamental purposes. 



Hence I urge, as emphatically as may be, the use of our 

 native plants: those plants which thrive in alkaline soil, which 

 can stand six months of drouth, which do not sunscald and 

 lose their stems and leaves on one side, which are rigid and 



