DECIDUOUS ORNAMENTAL TREES. 141 
As the ash grows strongly, and the roots, which extend to 
a great distance, ramify near the surface, it exhausts the soil 
underneath and around it to an astonishing degree. For this 
reason, the grass is generally seen in a very meagre and starved 
condition in a lawn where the ash tree abounds. Here and 
there a single tree of the ash will have an excellent effect, 
seen from the windows of the house ; but we would chiefly 
employ it for the grand masses, and to intermingle with other 
large groups of trees in an extensive plantation. When the 
ash is young, it forms a well-rounded head ; but when older, 
the lower branches bend towards the ground, and then slightly 
turn up in a very graceful manner. We take pleasure in 
quoting what that great lover, and accurate delineator of for- 
est beauties, Mr. Gilpin, says of the ash. “ The ash gene- 
rally carries its principal stem higher than the oak, and rises 
in an easy flowing line. But its chief beauty consists in the 
lightness of its whole appearance. Its branches at first keep 
close to the trunk, and form acute angles with it ; but as 
they begin to lengthen, they generally take an easy sweep, 
and the looseness of the leaves corresponding with the light- 
ness of the spray, the whole forms an elegant, depending 
foliage. Nothing can have a better effect than an old 
ash hanging from the corner of a wood, and bringing off 
the heaviness of the other foliage with its loose pendant 
branches .” — ( Forest Scenery , p. 82.) 
The highest and most characteristic beauty of the Ameri- 
can White ash (and we consider it the finest of all the species,) 
is the colouring which its leaves put on in autumn. Gilpin 
complains that the leaf of the European ash u decays in a 
dark, muddy, unpleasing tint.” Not so the White ash. In an 
American wood, such as often lines and overhangs the banks 
of the Hudson, the Connecticut, and many of our noble north- 
