110 
HARDY EVERGREENS. 
because the grand object is to procure them 
of the sizes and figures best adapted for the 
purposes required, and of the varieties best 
adapted for contrast. There is, perhaps, no 
Evergreen which presents so great a choice, 
hence the Holly should be depended on as a 
main subject for the general outline and for 
conspicuous situations. The more strikingly 
fine varieties should be in the foreground, 
or be placed as single specimens. The tree 
kinds should be for the middles of clumps 
or the backs of borders, diversifying the fi- 
gures, colours, and heights, so as to produce 
at proper distances agreeable effects. The 
bloom of the Holly is not valued; it is, indeed, 
insignificant, but the fruit or berries are rich 
coral or bright lemon colour, and form a 
beautiful contrast to the foliage. The Holly, 
too, bears the knife as well as any shrub 
in cultivation, and is frequently clipped into 
fantastic forms, an unworthy and child-like 
proceeding, and only mentioned to show the 
capacity of the plant to bear pruning. It 
should always have enough of the knife to 
prevent its growing thin and lanky, and out 
of a handsome tree or shrub form, but not 
enough to make it formal. Such is the variety 
of the Holly, that a shrubbery with nothing 
else in it could be made very imposing, though 
there are too many handsome Evergreens to 
render this necessary. The greatest contrast 
that can be produced by the side of the Holly 
is, perhaps, the Yew and the Pinus, the 
foliage of these being contrary in every 
particular: and the latter, the Pinus tribe, 
affords another wonderful diversity of foliage 
and figure among themselves. There are 
nearly one hundred species and varieties to- 
gether, besides nearly thirty under the section 
Abies, and a dozen under the section Picea. 
But, as in other large families, many of these 
are too much alike to use by way of contrast, 
though some are remarkably showy and dis- 
tinct, and well deserve places in the most 
choice arboretums and shrubberies; and there 
are many valuable new ones recently intro- 
duced, which are hardly common yet among 
the nurseries. 
THE PINUS TRIBE. 
The Pinus tribe is so singular, and so utterly 
beyond all management by pruning, that at- 
tention must be paid to its ultimate growth, 
when we are choosing the varieties for plant- 
ing. Many of them have very strong charac- 
teristics, which contrast finely; and in mixing 
shrubs for effect, they form a rich and elegant 
ornamental variety. Some of them are light 
and delicate in appearance ; others are finely 
clothed with close long foliage, forming a 
round feather on every branch ; others throw 
their branches out flat and fan-like. Some 
hang pendulous, some grow upright, but all 
are beautiful; and all trees; none of them form 
shrubs. They grow naturally with one trunk, 
which, if not damaged, continues straight; the 
branches uniform all round it, from the bottom 
to the top, and forming a beautiful pyramid, 
acute or otherwise, according to the sort, and 
utterly incapable of being formed into a shrub. 
To enumerate the many varieties would be 
to perplex the reader, who, with a hundred 
names before him, not one in ten of which he 
ever heard before, would be puzzled for a 
choice. Nothing in the least degree connected 
with plantations so much requires the choice 
to be made from growing specimens ; for if 
any one could give the proper attention to the 
various importations from all parts of the 
world, many, with different names given by 
botanists as well as importers, would be found 
identical. If very few varieties are wanted, 
the Spruce Fir, the Scotch Fir, the Weymouth 
Pine, Pinus Cembra, all of which are very 
cheap, will be found good enough for moderate 
places; and the Larch Fir, with which, by the 
by, we have no business here, as it is decidu- 
ous, forms, when in leaf, a most beautiful 
contrast. However, there are few nurseries 
which have not a good choice of this tribe, if 
they pretend to grow Evergreens at all ; and 
the best way is, to go and choose them for 
their habit, form, colour, size, or other pecu- 
liarities ; remembering that they are tall trees 
before they have done growing ; and that, if 
not spoiled, and if cultivated in good ground, 
they maintain their forms to the last ; except, 
indeed, that the lower branches, like those of 
all other trees almost, will decay first. There- 
fore must we, in choosing, look especially to 
this ; and at the time of planting, take care 
that we do not place them where they will 
hide other subjects by their advancing growth. 
If Hollies are, then, capable of almost forming 
a beautiful evergreen garden by their own 
almost endless varieties, what may not be 
done by Hollies and the Pinus tribe combined, 
when probably, to say the very least, twenty 
very distinct Hollies, and twice as many very 
distinct Pines, may be selected ? The fruit of 
the Pinus tribe forms no inconsiderable ad- 
dition to the appearance of a good selection. 
They are not only of very different forms, but 
they are also differently disposed on the trees; 
and, as many of them bear fruit in abundance, 
at the height of six or seven feet, they may 
in some cases be selected for their fruit rather 
than their foliage, though the latter is in no 
case other than handsome. Some of the most 
remarkable of the Pinus tribe are — 
Pinus Australis, or Palustris, from North 
America, 1730. 
P. Cembra (and varieties), from Siberia, 
1746. 
P. Coulteri, from California, 1832. 
