ON WOOD AND PLANTATIONS. 
113 
these forms, as in oblong or drooping trees, are similar, will 
infallibly create sameness. In order then to produce beauti- 
ful variety, which shall neither, on the one side, run into con- 
fusion, nor on the other, verge into monotony, it is re- 
quisite to give some little attention to the harmony of form 
and colour in the composition of trees in artificial planta- 
tions. 
The only rules which we can suggest to govern the planter 
are these : First, if a certain leading expression is desired in 
a group of trees, together with as great a variety as possible, 
such species must be chosen as harmonize with each other 
in certain leading points. And, secondly, in occasionally 
intermingling trees of opposite characters, discordance may 
be prevented, and harmonious expression promoted, by in- 
terposing other trees of an intermediate character. 
In the first case, suppose it is desired to form a group 
of trees, in which gracefulness must be the leading expres- 
sion. The willow alone would have the effect ; but in 
groups, willows alone produce sameness : in order, therefore, 
to give variety, we must choose other trees which, while they 
differ from the willow in some particulars, agree in others. 
The elm has much larger and darker foliage, while it has 
also a drooping spray ; the weeping birch differs in its leaves, 
but agrees in the pensile flow of its branches ; the common 
birch has few pendant boughs, but resembles in the airy 
lightness of its leaves ; and the three-thorned acacia, though 
its branches are horizontal, as delicate foliage of nearly the 
same hue and floating lightness as the willow. Here we 
have a group of five trees, which is, in the whole, full of 
gracefulness and variety, while there is nothing in the com- 
position inharmonious to the practised eye. 
To illustrate the second case, let us suppose a long sweep- 
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