290 
A COMPARISON OF THE 
Lights and Shadows. —The quality of trees, which is least 
observed except by painters, and yet one which has much to do 
with their expression, and our preferences for one or another sort, 
is their manner of reflecting the light in masses, so that it is 
brought into high relief by the dark shade of openings in the 
foliage, against which the lights are contrasted. If the reader will 
study trees, he will see that the lines of light and shade in the 
Lombardy poplar, Fig. 80, are nearly vertical, and in narrow strips, 
Fig. 8o. in harmony with the outlines of the tree, while in the 
balsam fir and the beech, Fig. 81, they are in nearly hori¬ 
zontal layers, and looking as though the tree had been 
built up in stratas. Most of the arbor-vitae family grow 
so compact that their shadows, seen at a little distance, 
are much like those of solid bodies, the openings in their 
spray being so small, that their surfaces are little broken 
by shadows. Young apple, maple, and chestnut trees, 
present, when young, such unbroken surfaces of leaves, 
that it is proper to say of them, then, that they have in¬ 
sipid or unformed characters. Compare the cut of the 
young apple, Fig. 82, with an old tree, Fig. 83, or the 
young maple, Fig. 84, with the mature one, Fig. 85, and 
it will be seen that not merely their outlines have changed with 
age, but that there are bolder shadows, and consequently more 
striking lights in the masses of their foliage. 
The native chestnut (Castanea vesca) ex¬ 
hibits a much more radical change from 
youth to age in its shadows. When young 
it resembles in form the young apple tree; 
but when middle-aged, it breaks up into 
broader masses than any other native tree, 
except the white oak, which in age it most 
resembles. Fig. 105 shows its characteristic 
break of light and shadow. It will be seen 
that it is neither in vertical nor horizontal lines, but quite irregular, 
and in large, instead of small masses. Herein consists one of the 
characteristics that distinguish majestic, or grand, from simply beau¬ 
tiful trees. The sugar maple, as shown in Fig. 85, is broken into 
Fig. 81. 
