286 
A COMPARISON OF THE 
of our hardy trees, both deciduous and evergreen. Many of them 
are most interesting, curious, and picturesque decorations of small 
lawns. They include every variety of outline, from the columnar 
poplar, the slender junipers, and the majestic weeping willow, down 
to the sorts that creep along the ground. The weeping junipers 
and arbor-vitaes {Thuja) are pensile only at the extremities of their 
limbs ; the new pendulous firs (Abies excelsa pendula and Picea pec- 
tinata pendula ) are slenderly conical, but with branches drooping 
directly and compactly downwards around a central stem. The 
hemlock and Norway spruce firs belong partly to the class of 
weeping trees on account of their pendant plumy spray, and the 
droop of their branches as they grow old, although both are rigidly 
conical trees in their general outlines. The weeping white birches 
have upright branches and pendulous spray when young, but as 
they inciease in size the larger branches bend with rambling grace 
in harmony with their spray, and form picturesquely symmetrical 
spreading trees; while the weeping beech, assuming every uncouth 
contortion when young, becomes a tree of noble proportions, mag¬ 
nificently picturesque with age, trailing its slender crooked limbs, 
covered with a drapery of dark glossy foliage from its summit to 
the ground. See illustration under head of “The Beech.” 
Fig. 76. 
Picturesque Forms.— There are 
trees which cannot easily be classified— 
trees of straggling or eccentric growth, 
like the weeping elm, Fig. 76, the honey 
locust, Fig. 77, and the weeping 
beech, Fig. 104; diffuse and rambling 
trees like young scarlet oaks, old 
larches and pines, and most of the 
birch family. These highly picturesque 
forms are exceptional among park-grown trees, 
and are charming because they are exceptional. 
Some of the preceding illustrations show how 
trees may at the same time be symmetrical and 
picturesque; and we ask the reader to observe how much more 
interesting a tree is which combines both beauties than the 
