Art Out-of-Doors 
of all our landscapes or garden-pictures. 
Ye t we see it everywhere, in every kind of 
situation. 
It grows easily and very quickly, it is not 
nice with regard to soils or sites, and it puts 
forth its leaves very early in the spring. 
These facts recommend it, and some people 
find it beautiful, while more believe that it 
is “ poetic. ” It is planted perpetually; 
but it seldom looks even reasonably well, 
and it is hard to say where it ought to 
look best. I confess, indeed, that I don’t 
care about it at all myself. I can see that 
it has a certain individual charm, and am 
ready to agree that, rightly placed, this 
charm might increase the beauty of a land- 
scape-picture. But in all my wanderings I 
never once have seen it rightly placed ; I 
never once have seen it where it did not 
hurt the effect of its surroundings, or, at 
least, if it stood apart from other trees, 
where some tree of a different species would 
not have looked far better. Our gardens 
owe much to the Chinese, but they have 
done a good deal to offset their claims up- 
on our gratitude by sending us the weep- 
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