POPULAR 
DECIDUOUS AND EVERGREEN 
TREES AND SHRUBS. 
CHAPTER I. 
INTRODUCTORY. 
“ A taste for rural improvements of every description,” says 
Downing, “is advancing silently, but with great rapidity in 
this country.” This is evident from the immense number of 
trees and shrubs that are planted from year to year in all private 
and public grounds, upon the borders of our country roads, the 
streets of our small towns and villages, and the suburbs of large 
cities. 
As a nation we progress rapidly in the accumulation of 
wealth, and perhaps we may with safety be called a “money- 
getting people ;” but with all our love of money it has thus far 
in the course been gained more for the enjoyments it would 
purchase, or the good the owner was enabled to do therewith, 
than for the simple, yet base, purpose of hoarding. While we 
have no law to compel a man to plant a tree upon the roadside 
on reaching manhood’s age, or upon the birth of each child, we 
have as a people so much of enterprise and taste, so much 
ambition and love of home adornment, that w T e are unwilling to 
rest quiet without the association, comfort, and enjoyment in all 
ways derived from cooling shades and fragrant flowers. 
