WALKS AND TALKS AT BREEZE HILL— VI 



Wherein is Reflective, Critical, Philosophical, and Friendly Comment About Plants 

 and Their Behavior, Inspired by Personal Experiences in a Garden Made for Pleasure 



J. HORACE McFARLAND 



SPRING PLANTING FOR COLOR IN WINTER 



= S THE garden dead in winter? Not mine; it is full of 

 life, and full of color — color that compares witrTsummer 

 somewhat as a Mozart string quartette compares with 

 a Strauss waltz. Both are enjoyable, but this winter 

 color-music is more intellectual than it is emotional. 



Two rheumatic knees and a hard-hearted doctor have been 

 interfering with my daily garden journey, but this bright mid- 

 january Sunday I just had to take a chance on both, because the 

 first clean snow-blanket is reflecting all the lovely color in a way 

 not possible so long as the browning grass and the soil absorb 

 the light. To-day the garden glows again in warmth and winter 

 brightness. There is no chill in the color, whatever the ther- 

 mometer may say. 



Thunberg's Scarlet-Jeweled Barberry 



IT IS rather a tradition to depend on berries for winter color, 

 but where birds own the place, and a garden-loving human 

 is a mere incidental owner, the berries soon perform their food 

 function and are not a color factor! The Thunberg Barberry, 

 of course, still holds its scarlet sprinkle, because the birds won't 

 touch it while other food can be had, and the Breeze Hill hedge 

 consequently yet carries a Christmas brilliance. 



That same Barberry, by the way, has and does disappoint 

 me by its unorthodox vigor. It was planted ten years ago on a 

 three-foot "maturity" basis, but much of it now touches six 

 feet in height, and more than two yards in depth. I have been 

 too kind to it, and it is only by annual trenching and root- 

 pruning inside that I can keep it from wholly possessing the good 

 borders it backs. I suspect my neighbor, who planted smaller 

 stock a year later, did better than he intended, though he now 

 seems to envy the year-round attractiveness of my hedge. 1 have 

 found it possible to get the height down about a foot, without the 

 hateful formality resulting from shearing, by cutting out the high 

 places well down into the plant, and so not interfering with the 

 graceful informality which is a special merit of this fine thing. 



Evergreens That Endure 



BUT that winter color which started me to gossip begins, 

 naturally, with the evergreens. The Norway Spruces I 

 wish I didn't have at Breeze Hill — they are poor things at their 

 forty-five years, just when they should be taking on an appear- 

 ance of stability — are dull brown-green, and the least alive- 

 looking of all the conifers. The Hemlocks are much brighter 

 and the few cherished White Pines are cheerful. 



NO CHILL IN THIS WINTER-COLOR PICTURE 



The hanging snow reveals new charms and interests in the varied patterns of 

 the bare branches foiled by the heavier masses supported by the Evergreens 



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