322 



FLORA AND SYLVA, 



and Britain are ample to give fine effects, 

 and some form tall timber trees like the 

 White Willow. There is also a superb 

 group of weeping trees among these 

 Willows, some of them more precious 

 and hardy than the Babylonian Willow. 

 This is worth bearing in mind when 

 seeking good and artistic effects. Take, 

 for example, a piece of water, good in 

 form of margin and right in every way 

 in relation to the landscape ; it is quite 

 easy to spoil the effect of it all by the 

 use of trees which have not the form or 

 colour characteristic of the waterside. 

 By the right use of trees fitted to the soil 

 we may, on the other hand, make the 

 scene beautiful in delicate colour and 

 fine form; in a word, right at all seasons 

 whether asa picture, as covert, and even 

 for timber, for some of the Willows have 

 a high value as timber. 



The best trees for waterside plant- 

 ing are those of our own country, or of 

 Europe and the northern world gene- 

 rally ; though we need not refuse things 

 that come to us from other countries. 

 People are so much misled by showy 

 descriptions in catalogues, and also by 

 their own blindness to ugly things, that 

 we often see misuse beside the water of 

 variegated trees and shrubs like the Yel- 

 low Elder, the Purple Beech, and other 

 things of the worst kind for such a place. 



There are many Willows, 

 but for good effect the best 

 are the " Tree- Willows " 

 — those which may be had on their na- 

 tural roots, and of some timber value. 

 The best of these for our country is the 

 White Willow, lovely at all times, but 

 especially on days of wind and storm 



Tree Willows 

 for Effect. 



when other things are often at their 

 worst. The best planting I ever did was 

 of a bundle of White Willows on an ugly 

 bank made without thought across a 

 pond ; the erfect obtained is excellent, 

 and even the stiff bank is lost to view. 

 The hybrids of the White Willow (Bed- 

 ford Willow) are good also, and next best 

 for colour is the Yellow Willow (Salix 

 vitellind) — classed by botanists as a 

 variety of the White Willow — but for 

 planters distinct in stature, form, and 

 colour. It is often seen beside northern 

 and Irish rivers, but when massed in a 

 marsh or bog, or beside a wide river, it 

 is fine in effect and the best of all in 

 wintry days. The Red Willow (Cardinal 

 Willow) is a form of it, with the same 

 shape and even brighter colour. The 

 Crack Willow (S.jragilis) is not so good 

 in colour but is very picturesque in form 

 upon river banks, and quite worthy of a 

 place among the Tree-Willows. The 

 new weeping form of the Yellow Willow 

 (aS". vitellina penduld) is beautiful, but the 

 desire to increase it quickly has led to 

 graftinginnurseries,which means death, 

 and ugliness in dying. To strike root as 

 freely as a Willow is a proverb, yet men 

 will graft them where the result is cer- 

 tain failure. There is not only the loss 

 of a beautiful tree, but the stock upon 

 which it is grafted — usually the Osier 

 (aS*. viminalis) — comes up instead, like 

 a tree- weed to obscure the view, and very 

 difficult to get rid of. Many beautiful 

 Willows of a rarer kind than the Tree- 

 Willows here named have been raised, 

 but the few who plant lose them through 

 grafting on the Osier. 



After Willows, the Poplars come in 



