THE PLANTEk's GUIDE. 



101 



Avest in this island — from wliicli side they seem to bend, 

 and exhibit in consequence a very unseemly appearance. 

 The same thing also takes place in close plantations, 

 where they are mechanically injured by others. Of this 

 propensity to bend to the gale, the Beech and the Larch 

 are remarkable examples; and there is scarcely any tree, 

 the Sycamore perhaps excepted, which, does not exhibit a 

 weather side towards the blast, and towards the opposite 

 side throw out by far the longest and stoutest branches. 

 In other words, all trees growing for a certain time in 

 exposed situations, or even in close ones where they 

 cannot equally expand, may be said to be ill balanced. 

 This, in parks much exposed, is found a very serious 

 eyesore; as in such situations the stems describe very 

 unequal angles with the surface, singularly acute on the 

 one side, and as obtuse on the other. It is true the 

 painter sometimes makes use of such objects in his land- 

 scapes, as being agreeable to nature. Kent, the father of 

 landscape gardening, planted dead trees in his earlier 

 designs, the better to imitate natural variety, until he was 

 laughed out of the practice by his friends or rivals. But 

 most planters of the present day will regard it as safer 

 and more judicious to copy beautiful rather than deformed 

 nature in most instances, and leave those picturesque 

 effects which disfigurement occasionally supplies to be 

 produced by accident, rather than by intentional labour. 



In order to remedy the striking deformity in question, 

 I have, in transplanting, uniformly reversed the position of 

 the tree in its new situation. By that means, and in 

 consequence of greater warmth, the greater activity of 

 vegetation is transferred to the deficient side, the equal 

 balance of the tree is gradually effected, and its beauty 

 and symmetry are unspeakably augmented. In exposed 

 situations, there is no other possible way of procuring a 



