The Best Evergreen Vine for America — By wilheim Milk 



THE "EVERGREEN BITTERSWEET," OR CLIMBING EUONYMUS, WHICH IS HARDIER 

 THAN ENGLISH IVY AND HAS RED FRUITS THAT ARE ATTRACTIVE ALL WINTER 



New 

 r, York 



IS IVY the best vine in the world? Doubt- 

 less every Englishman will cry "Yes!" 

 because the European or English ivy 

 (Hedera Helix) is the oldest evergreen vine 

 in cultivation and has made the deepest 

 impression in literature, art and history. 

 But if your standard is merit, not asso- 

 ciations, there is another vine which seems 

 to me inherently better, viz., the climbing 

 euonymus or, as I now propose to call it 

 the "evergreen bittersweet." True, the 

 form of its leaf is not unique, like that of 

 ivy, but it has one overwhelming advant- 

 age in its gorgeous red berries which are 

 resplendent all winter against a noble 

 background of evergreen foliage. And in 

 many other ways it has greater value than 

 ivy, even in regions where the ivy is hardy. 



The accompanying pictures give but a 

 faint hint of the five-fold glories of the 

 evergreen bittersweet. In the first place, 

 it is evergreen, and 

 therefore has an ob- 

 vious advantage over 

 deciduous vines in 

 being beautiful 365 

 days of the year, in- 

 stead of two weeks or 

 seven months. 



Secondly, it is very 

 accommodating as to 

 soils, climate, expos- 

 ures; is easy to grow; 

 and will trail over the 

 ground or climb to 

 the noble height of 

 thirty feet, e. g., at 

 Westbury, N. Y. 



Thirdly, it has an 

 immense advantage 

 over ivy, in being 

 much hardier, grow- 

 ing twenty feet high 

 in New E.ngland 

 where ivy can be 

 grown only as a 

 ground-cover. 



Fourthly, its sup- 

 erb red fruits, which 

 closely resemble those 

 of our common wild 

 bittersweet, seem di- 

 vinely appointed to redeem our American 

 winters from their bleak, ugly, and cheer- 

 less moods. 



And fifthly, it promises to develop a 

 strong American character, becoming as 

 universal and as dear to the American heart 

 as ivy is in Europe. 



For, although it is a foreign plant, it 

 comes from the closely allied climate of 

 Japan, and it likes our conditions so well 

 that it has already started to run wild in 

 America, sowing its own seeds and making 

 great pictures of immortal beauty, as at 

 Swan Point Cemetery, Providence, R. I. 



If I had a million dollars to spare I should 

 like to plant an evergreen bittersweet 

 against every stone, brick, and concrete 

 wall in America. The effect would be elec- 

 trical, for it would add 100 per cent, to the 

 beauty of America. And it would only be 

 anticipating by 100 years what will surely 

 happen, for it is hardly possible that the 

 world holds any plant with greater power 

 to transform a house into a home. As in 

 England every home and every church is 

 enriched, dignified and ennobled by ivy, 

 so every American home will come to be 

 connected so closely with the evergreen 

 bittersweet that it will be impossible to 

 think of one without the other. 



"But what about San Jose scale!" you 

 exclaim, thinking you have pierced my 

 aeroplane in a fatal spot. Ah, dear friend, 

 you must be thinking of the variegated 

 sorts — the white-margined, rosy-margined 



The best form of the evergreen bittersweet — the variety vegetus. So hardy that it can withstand 

 winter sunshine. Photographed on Long Island 



and netted, which, in my humble opinion, 

 are not worth the powder to blow them up. 

 True the nurseryman may force them upon 

 you, unless you are careful to specify 

 the green-leaved forms, on the principle 

 that a variegated plant makes a bigger show 

 for the money by reason of its unnatural 

 color. Unfortunately for his theory, most 

 variegated plants have a weak constitution 

 and tend to look sickly. These variegated 

 varieties of euonymus, which you' see in 

 every rich man's garden, can sometimes be 

 coaxed to attain a height of ten feet, but 

 not to bear fruit, and they are puny and 



155 



futile compared with the magnificent, 

 lusty hardihood of the green-leaved varie- 

 ties. On the whole it is a blessing that the 

 scale loves to devour these artificial, gaudy, 

 and commonplace weaklings. 



The plant I sing is abundantly able to 

 take care of itself, thank you. The plain 

 Euonymus radicans is better than any 

 variegated variety, because it bears fruit 

 and is hardier. Like every good plant, 

 however, it has limitations. The vine 

 often produces variegated branches, and it 

 is something of a bore to cut these out. 



Again, it does not make a smooth ground 

 cover, for it has a way of humping up at 

 intervals whenever it takes a notion to 

 climb, and though you may cut back these 

 hummocks they spoil the uniformity of 

 surface, as I observed at Gen. S. M. Weld's 

 place at Dedham, Mass., where this creeper 

 was used to cover the ground in rhodo- 

 dendron beds. As a 

 climber it has another 

 mean trick, for it 

 stands up stiffly when 

 it reaches the top of a 

 wall instead of arch- 

 ing over or hanging 

 gracefully. This is 

 rather embarrassing in 

 a formal garden, e. g., 

 the rose garden at 

 Blairsden, for if you 

 behead the thing it 

 sprouts hydra-like 

 and is too suggestive 

 of a convict's head or 

 four-days' beard. On 

 the other hand, the 

 ordinary E. radicans 

 is cheaper than any of 

 its improved varieties 

 and is perhaps the 

 best for wild garden- 

 ing. Whether it self- 

 sows or is distributed 

 by birds I do not 

 know, but a good 

 stock can be worked 

 up rather quickly at 

 home because it takes 

 root freely when lay- 

 ered. And I am happy to say that this 

 noble vine is beginning to naturalize itself 

 in America for it has already run wild in 

 some woods. 



The first notable improvement, it is said, 

 was the variety Carrieri, which is commonly 

 described as having larger and therefore 

 showier leaves, and larger berries, but these 

 are perhaps not so abundant as in the wild 

 form. And now comes a surprising thing, 

 for some cultivators claim that this variety 

 is nothing more than the fruiting branches 

 of Euonymus radicans, which have been 

 propagated by cuttings! 



