PARK AND CEMETERY 
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same royal effect. This use of young native oaks has 
been general where oaks occur, throughout the towns 
of Iowa, and lends to some of them, as Davenport, a 
peculiar charm, although the narrow limits of a city lot 
often afford small room for finest effects. In the rural 
districts so far, such use of native oak trees is unfor- 
tunately rare. Our country people do not in this re- 
spect at all appreciate their opportunities. Many a 
man strips the hilltop of its native decoration, builds 
his house, and then plants soft maples or box-alders 
about his door for shade. 
But for the vastly greater number of homes in our 
prairie states, if we are to have outdoor art at all, it 
must be planted, and the question what to plant is all- 
important. As just remarked, we have planted soft 
maples or box-alders because these have the advantage 
of rapid growth. They have certainly fulfilled their 
purpose and have been an invaluable aid to the civil- 
ization of the west. But it is time they gave way to 
something better. Beauty here depends, in part at 
least, upon variety. And now then our native forest 
flora comes to afford us the variety we seek. Simply 
to enumerate the species ready to our hand would take 
too much, far too much, time. We may here call at- 
tention to but a very few. 
Of evergreen, which for decorative purposes per- 
haps claim attention first, we have three species na- 
tive to the whole Northern Mississippi Valley: the 
white pine, the juniper, commonly called the red cedar, 
and the balsam. Than the first there is no nobler tree. 
Its long, straight arms, its pale soft foliage, lend a 
grace to any landscape, and where, as often we find 
in nature, the pine forms background for the other 
species named, whether over the snow of winter or 
the verdure of summer, the harmonies of color are un- 
excelled. Evergreens look best when grouped, and 
the three conifers named may be grouped with sur- 
prising effectiveness. Isolated trees upon a lawn pos- 
sess their attraction, but our rural homes, affording 
ampler space, should reach the more magnificent 
effects attained by grouping. 
Among deciduous trees, the American elm is de- 
servedly a universal favorite. No other tree comes 
near it in certain situations. For instance, it is almost 
the only street tree that we have. No other is at once 
so hardy and so graceful. When the long branches 
touch their tips from either side above the smooth and 
gravelled road, the privileged traveler passes on be- 
neath a Gothic archway, more elegant and airy than 
architects can dream. Henry Seventh’s Chapel is a 
forest of elms turned to stone, with pendant, stony 
lamps. The living tree makes real temples, aisles of 
beauty, the floating clouds are incense, the birds are 
choirs. Now the American elm may take its proper 
place as a street tree in every county in Iowa ; that 
means in all this imperial vallev. 
Happily most of our native trees will grow any- 
where if planted together and protected until they 
shade the ground, although some affect special soil 
and conditions. The hard maple, Acer saccharum, for 
instance, our most delightful tree, is difficult to man- 
age for this reason. The beauty of the tree has ever 
tempted people to plant it, and this one species failing, 
they have tried no other. It has ever been planted along 
the street. But the hard maple is a forest tree and de- 
mands forest conditions. But there are other trees 
that will grow rapidly in good soil. The linden, the 
wild cherry, the walnut, all do finely, grow fast, and 
flourish well together. You want a park? Start a 
grove with a variety of our trees and the variety will 
tend to increase. Nature will make the park for you; 
winds and birds will serve, and you will presently have 
something of primeval wealth, and all the richness of 
changing and varied foliage which natural conditions 
insure. You may later change and shape at will. 
There is more than the surface meaning in Emerson’s 
remark that the “forest is God’s plantation.” But let 
us carry this idea a little further. 
The wild apples of the Mississippi valley constitute 
a group of entirely neglected trees, and yet in the 
whole world there is nothing more delicately beautiful 
than a crab-apple thicket in full flower. Whether we 
consider the effect of the solid mass of fragrant bloom, 
or whether we are more attracted by the delicate 
shades of red which tinge the single petals, there is 
nowhere in the gardens of the old world or in the 
tropics of the new anything finer or sweeter than the 
simple, old-fashioned crab-apple. The various thorn 
trees follow hard after. These are beautiful, both in 
spring and in fall ; for the coral red fruit is one of the 
charms of autumn. Next to the crab-apple, both in 
Nature and science, stand the wild plums and cherries. 
Surely no one need be told how beautiful are these ; 
yet they are slipping from our attention and becom- 
ingly rapidly extinct. Like pleasant memories of early 
years comes the sweet breath of the plum thicket in its 
April whiteness. _ The choke cherry is an elegant, 
graceful little tree. If cared for it is exceedingly 
shapely, and in spring its pendant clusters of white 
bloom contrast with the rich green leaves. Later on, 
the shining black fruit is equally handsome and feeds 
the happy birds. With these must be mentioned in 
shrubs for the dooryard, the bladder-nut, with its 
abundant, persistent, honey-laden bloom, yielding in 
autumn the curious white inflated pods with rattling 
seeds; Wahoo, whose myriads of early appearing 
purple bloom suggest the popular name, “burning- 
hush ;” its scarlet fruits, long after the leaves 
have fallen, shine above November snow and tempt the 
lingering waxwing or belated thrush ; the witch-hazel, 
with beautiful yellow blossoms, all the more welcome 
for the time at which they come, October, putting on 
the garb of summer when everything else is brown and 
sear, and actually ripening its fruit in the following 
spring, setting at defiance the whole calendar of flow- 
ers — a wonderful shrub. All these are beautiful, and 
when planted together, make an elegant effect. All 
are hardy, because all are native. 
Another shrub which deserves a place on the list 
of every planter is the so-called wolf-berry, symphori- 
carpus occidentalis. This is one of the handsomest of 
little shrubs ; its foliage is of delicate refreshing tint, 
its flowers of lovely color and finish, profuse in July 
and August, its white berries are the decorations of 
the autumn border. I am glad to see this planted in 
Milwaukee parks, but it is native far into South Da- 
kota. 
As to vines, we have the Ampelopsis, the Virgin’s 
Bower, the Bittersweet, the wild grape ; nothing more 
vigorous than the first, more beautiful in flower and 
fruit than the second, finer in autumn than the third, 
delicately perfumed and in every way desirable than 
the fourth. The list might be instantly doubled did 
time suffice. The point is as stated — that in the prairie 
