26 



THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 



V EBECAHY, 19 9 



Why does anyone want a mountain ash with 

 leaves like an oak, or a hawthorn with leaves 

 like celery, or an elm with leaves like a nettle, 

 or anything with curled or hooded leaves? 



The legitimate way to get cut-leaved 

 effects is to use trees that are normally fine- 

 leaved, not the abnormal varieties of maple, 

 alder, beech, oak, elm, and linden. When- 

 ever we want trees for thin, open effects, let 

 us use our own deciduous cypress, Ken- 

 tucky coffee tree, black locust, or Hercules's 

 club, or else the Japanese varnish tree. The 

 light filters down beautifully through their 

 pinnate leaves, and these trees live long. 



We grossly overdo all trees with " trop- 

 ical" or spectacular foliage, such as the large- 

 leaved magnolia and the ginkgo. They 

 are perfectly hardy and are not creations of 

 man, but is that any reason why we 

 should fill a peaceful scene with objects 

 startlingly different from our environment? 

 Our country, as a whole, can beat England 

 all hollow on variety, but too great variety 

 on any one place is our national failing. I 

 heard some Englishmen complain that the 

 English landscape is monotonous. On the 

 contrary, it is all the more home- like, be- 

 cause a few tried and true kinds of trees 

 appear everywhere. Some day our land- 

 scape, too, may look like the home of one 

 big, happy family. 



THE EFFECT OF FORMAL OUTLINES 



What possesses us to plant so many trees 

 that are living cubes, globes, cones, and 

 columns? They may be appropriate in 

 the garden, but rarely on the lawn. The 

 most conspicuous of these forms is the 

 columnar or fastigiate. The Lombardy 

 poplar is a living exclamation point. It 

 was the first ornamental tree we bought in 

 quantity. It spread like wildfire in America 

 and ruins many a fine landscape. A group 

 of three or five makes a splendid break in 



the skyline, but whole streets lined with it 

 are most unnatural and tiresome. 



The nurseries are full of "tree pretenders" 

 — such as the oak that mimics a cypress in 

 outline. Let us forget these horticultural 

 forms. After you have learned to know 

 and love beech, tulip tree, hawthorn, horse 

 chestnut, and other broadish trees, their 

 columnar varieties look pinched and un- 

 happy. When we want cones let us go to 

 the trees that naturally make cones, but 

 "not too all-fired perfect" cones, viz., the 

 spruces and other evergreens. 



I wish I could come back in 500 years so 

 as to find all the Kilmarnock weeping 

 willows gone. The original mulberry has 

 some dignity and interest, but Tea's weep- 

 ing mulberry on a lawn is simply ludicrous. 

 May the good Lord send a special bug to 

 devour all the horticultural "weepers," 

 especially the maples, dogwoods, lindens, 

 and oaks. In the garden the bug should 

 spare them, especially if they form tea 7 

 houses or summer-houses for children, but 

 let no guilty weeper on the lawn escape. 

 If we need pendulous foliage somewhere 

 why not plant something that is naturally 

 pendulous, like the Wisconsin willow ? * 



THE SHADE EFFECT 



There is no sense in planting any of the 

 trees that we commonly plant solely for shade, 

 because they die too soon or get unsightly. 

 If we need shade without delay we can 

 build a veranda or summer-house or trans- 

 plant a big tree. And if we plant long- 

 lived trees for other purposes the shade 

 problem will be solved incidentally. 



The English have an equally foolish pas- 

 sion for retaining old trees that are in the 

 way simply because they are old. "Most 

 of us plant too thickly," says William 



* Weeping trees were reviewed in The Garden Magazine 

 Vol. V. p. 76. 



An English park, 



showing why the trees are all flat -bottomed — the deer trim them, 

 horse chestnuts about a mile long at Bushey Park 



An avenue of 



We, can grow magnolias better than they can in 

 England. These large flowers are speciaUy wel- 

 come for early spring effects on lawns 



Robinson, the trees "get too close and we 

 neglect to thin them, the result being 

 moldy, close avenues, dripping, sunless 

 groves and dismal shrubberies." 



Whenever our houses are made damp 

 and moldy by trees it is usually because 

 trees with horizontal branches overhang 

 them, so that there is no chance for air to 

 circulate. The ideal tree near a house is 

 an American elm, not the English, which is 

 a most treacherous tree, dropping great 

 limbs without warning. 



Anyone who wishes an inspiring new 

 point of view toward shade trees should 

 read the chapter in the "English Flower 

 Garden," called "Air and Shade." 



THE AGE EFFECT 



If your grounds are large enough for a 

 tree that will grow a hundred feet high or 

 more, plant an oak. The grandest of 

 American oaks is the white oak (Q. alba), 

 and this is also the nearest equivalent of 

 the English, which generally fails here. 

 But the white oak is impossible to trans- 

 plant and very slow.. The quickest grow- 

 ing oaks are the pin, red, and scarlet. 



Plant American beech and linden in 

 preference to their English equivalents. 

 Plant red and sugar maples in preference to 

 the sycamore maple. 



The following characteristic American 

 trees will grow better here than in England, 

 and have often attained more than 100 feet 

 or 100 years: Honey locust, black walnut, 

 pin oak, red oak, black oak, white oak. 



The following cannot be expected to last 

 a century: Birches, elms, poplars, willows, 

 ailanthus, catalpa, box elder, silver maple, 

 English hawthorn, or any kind of chestnut. 



There are many ancient trees in Britain 

 that seem thoroughly at home, but they 

 were originally foreigners, e. g., chestnuts, 

 linden, larch, Norway spruce, and service 

 tree. But practically all came from a 

 related climate — that of Europe. A thou- 

 sand years from now many foreign trees 

 will be naturalized in America, and prac- 

 tically all will be from the Far East. But 

 America will never "find herself" until her 

 own trees are everywhere in the majority. 



