WEEPING DECIDUOUS TREES. 
53 
are familiar to all, is neglected, yet it deserves tlie attention of 
every planter of weeping trees. It may be that because we have 
so often watched the willow droop and dip its .branches in the 
water of some stream or lake, seeming as it were to sympathize 
with and kiss the sparkling drops that it disturbed as the gentle 
winds swayed its tresses of light and elegant foliage, we have 
come to love it, and regard no water landscape as complete 
without the graceful flowing lines of the old Babylonian willow. 
From long usage it has come to be associated with either water 
or the sadness of life — in the one case indicative of a marshy 
region or stream of water, in the other of the last resting-place 
Fig. 25 .— American, or Fountain Willow. 
of friends once on earth. Beautiful as it is in itself, however, 
these very associations preclude its introduction into almost any 
suburban or even extended country place. By the side of a 
spring at the foot of a hill, or bordering a stream where crossed 
by a bridge, or in large grounds, shading almost entirely from 
view the under-gardener’s house, are some of the places where its 
position produces a satisfactory effect ; but if planted near where 
art and architecture have combined to give a tone of grandeur 
and magnificence, its form of outline and waving spray seem 
rather to weaken than add to the appearance of cultivation and 
refinement 
