House and Garden 
arrangement and romance, poetry here revealed to 
give it added charm. We reach now the most 
wonderful of trees for color in the entire picture, a 
liquid ambar or sweet gum tree, No. 9. Here is a 
tree that commends itself for its ornamental value 
at all times of the year. In summer its star-like 
leaves are light green, and it is round of head, sturdy 
of trunk and straight of stem. The fruit or seed 
of the liquid ambar resembles somewhat the round 
button-ball of the sycamore tree; its bark is peculiar 
and corrugated, corky in places, giving it a unique 
character; it has great hollows in its trunk when old, 
and as its sweet gum was considered by the opossum 
and raccoon families a delicacy worth climbing for, 
the ante-bellum negroes in the South used to hunt 
them up this tree, and it became celebrated in the 
line of the old slave song: 
“ ’Possum up the gum tree, 
Coony in the hollah, 
Shake ’em down to me, sah, 
Give you quatah dollah.” 
It is smaller in size than the maple, oak or tulip trees, 
but it is one among only a half dozen trees remarkable 
for their vivid, varied fall appearance. Then its leaves 
show grades of color from almost a jet black and pur¬ 
ple to vivid green, yellow, orange, browns, red, crim¬ 
son and flaming scarlet, presenting a kaleidoscope of 
shapes and shades,—a tree in motley. This is a hardy 
tree and although a native of the South, it grows well 
in Tie latitude of New jersey. Care, however, must 
bejexercised if they should be moved at any time, for 
they are difficult to transplant successfully. 
Celebrated in song and romance and history, the 
inspiration of poet and painter, trees and flowers 
after a closer acquaintance become objects of our 
deepest interest. In group^ No. 26, as shown in 
Plate No. II, and larger ^in No. Ill, will be 
found a most interesting arrangement of trees 
and shrubs that help to paint the landscape. In 
the background, and massed also back of several 
of these glowing palettes of color are various 
groups and lines of trees of wild or native cherry, 
pin-oak, sassafras and chestnut trees, Nos. 15 to 
20 and 23 to 25 and 28 inclusive. This entire 
group occupies a space of 250 feet long by 75 feet 
wide. In front of the group, No. 27 is an American 
ash. No. 1 is a silver maple, by the side of No. 2, 
a Tartarian maple. This latter tree is hardy and 
among other peculiarities differing from the swamp 
maple, it is shrubby in form rather than tall and tree¬ 
like; it is seldom seen with a single stem or trunk 
but is branching in character. Under favorable 
conditions it may grow in time to a height of 15 to 20 
feet, but they are rarely seen so high. The leaf is 
pointed and arrowy in shape, unlike the well-known 
many pointed maple leaf. It turns a fiery red in the 
fall, hence its suggestive and classic name. 1 he 
Lombardy poplars, Nos. 4 and 6, slender and graceful 
shafts of green, as quaint as old village church spires, 
are here advantageously placed and in time will 
grow to break the skyline and give it irregularity. 
With these poplars are grouped Nos. 3 and 5, sassa¬ 
fras trees and also a ginkgo tree, Salisburia^adian- 
tifolia or maidenhair tree, for it resembles that 
