WHEN instructed taste goes hand in band with cultivated nature, scenery may be created; by studying the varying forms, and seizing on what some author calls "accidents," graceful groups may be produced, full of intricacy, possessing a good sky outline as well as a gracefully fringed vista; if the position of the plantation has been well-selected, groups complete in themselves as to form, and conducive to the general effect, may certainly be calculated on.

A guide to the kind of trees to be selected for planting a landscape, requires study and experience. We hear it said, occasionally, that we have as good trees as any other country; our own opinion is, that we have better; and yet, variety, and those plants that are foreign to one's neighborhood, are required to produce the necessary effects. Loudon was among the first to insist upon this, though many had studied it out without having given expression to the fact. He taught that, in modern landscape-gardening, considered as a fine art, all the more important beauties and effects produced by the artist, may be said to depend upon the use which he makes of foreign trees and shrubs. His reasons for this are grounded on the principle that all art, to be acknowleged as such, must be avowed. This is the case in the fine arts: there is no attempt to conceal art in music, poetry, painting, or sculpture; none in architecture; and none in the geometrical style of landscape-gardening. Why, he asks, should there be an attempt to conceal art in modern landscape-gardening? Because, we shall be told, it is an art which imitates nature.

But does not landscape-painting also imitate nature? and yet, in it, the work produced is acknowledged to be one of art? Before this point is settled, it is necessary to recur to what is meant by the imitation of nature, and to reflect on the difference between repetition and imitation. In what are called the imitative arts, it will be found that the imitation is always made in such a manner as to produce a totally distinct work from the thing imitated, and never, on any account, so like as to be mistaken for it. In landscape-painting, scenery is represented by colors on a flat surface; in sculpture, forms, which in nature are colored, are represented in colorless stone. 'The intention of the artist, in both cases, is not to produce a copy which shall be mistaken for the original, but rather to show the original through the medium of a particular description of art; to reflect nature as in a glass. Now, to render landscape-gardening a fine art, some analogous process must be adopted by the landscape-gardener. In the geometrical style he has succeeded perfectly, by arranging grounds and trees in artificial surfaces, forms, and lines, so different from nature as to be recognized at once as works of art.

A residence thus laid out, is clearly distinguished from the woody scenery of the surrounding country; and is so far satisfactory, as it displays the working of the human mind, and confers distinction on the owner as a man of wealth or taste.

A residence laid out in imitation of the undulations of nature, and the trees scattered over it in groups and masses, neither in straight lines, nor cut into artificial shapes, might be mistaken for nature, were not the trees planted, chiefly of foreign kinds not to be met with in the natural or general scenery of the country. Everything in modern landscape-gardening, therefore, depends on foreign trees and shrubs; and when it is once properly understood that no residence in the modern style can have a claim to be considered as laid out in good taste in which most, if not all, the trees and shrubs employed, are not foreign to the vicinity, or improved varieties of indigenous ones, the grounds of every country-seat will become an arboretum, differing only in the number of species which it contains.

* See Frontispiece.

We have had a series of single trees and groups prepared, to exhibit the beauties and the faults committed by planters, as well as to illustrate the necessity of looking forward to the well-ascertained effects that time will certainly produce by the growth of certain descriptions of trees and shrubs, plauted either singly or together. Groups are often planted in scenery, yet seldom is it performed in a satisfactory way. Attempts of this kind, in which the trees being all of one size, and planted in the most circumspect mode, at measured distances, would sometimes lead one to suspect they had been planned by using a foot rule.

As the beauties and defects of grouping will be displayed to the eye in these illustrations, we shall at once refer to our first plate; this will be followed by fifteen other illustrations, in succession, and our brief remarks on landscape and planting, will perhaps be more fully understood when the whole, having been printed in this volume, shall be read consecutively by those who take pleasure in this interesting topic.

Landscape In Connection With Tree Planting #1

THE pictures of the landscape of a private dwelling are formed in the vicinity of the mansion, or with special reference to the views from its windows, balconies, or piazzas. In the execution of this, the most refined taste, united with a competent share of practical, botanical, and arboricultural knowledge, is necessary to success; the painter's eye should also have its influence. If water entered into the composition, it would be disposed in its natural place; the banks be as natural as possible, nor. should too much of the water be exposed in one place, unless it could appear as a reach. Buildings should be only partially exposed, with the most characteristic angle jutting out from among trees, shrubs, and vines. Thus the hard lines in the dressed ground would be hidden, the asperities softened, and the exuberance of the imagination would have full play. In planting a larger lawn or a park, and adjusting trees in them, the dressed ground should be linked easily and naturally with the scene, by placing groups of trees and bushes of the same relation or character as those of the kept ground, so as to appear parts of one mass or group; thus preventing a sudden break between the two scenes.

As there is a great diversity of character in places which are to be laid out, the improver ought to have a general stock of knowledge, to be drawn upon as opportunity offers; no rule can be applicable to all places, and it is impossible to lay down any code of laws by which a place can be properly improved without a tasteful directiou. Perhaps, therefore, the best mode of conveying to the reader a knowledge of the principles and practice of this delightful art, is to first impress him with the beauty of single trees, their character of outline, leaf, and spray, and then to show him the principles of grouping as established by the concurrent taste of the painter and the improver.

From what has been said, it will be apparent that both the planting and thinning of ornamental trees require the attention of a skilful hand. The form and varieties of a group or groups, must be studied. When two only are planted, at least so close together as to intermingle their branches (Fig. 15), as before observed, the best effect is produced when they are placed as near to each other as, to all appearance, to form but one tree, as also seen in Fig. 6, in the February number, and the Beech (Fig. 18). In Fig. 13, the small Spruce Fir is highly injurious, but greatly improves Fig. 14. An Ash with a Scotch Fir, the Horse-chestnut with the Larch or Narrow Poplar (Fig. 16), would be as improper as the Round-headed Lime with the Spruce Fir (Fig. 13). The union of a spiral with a flame-sbaped tree, as the Lombardy Poplar (Fig. 16), is out of keeping, compared with Fig. 17, when a greater breadth of Poplars is introduced, which may form the centre of a group planted on the left as well as on the right.

These portraits, addressed to the eye, will prove of great assistance to those who are desirous of appreciating the beauty of groups.

Few will deny that one of the chief beauties of shrubberies and ornamental plantations, is the variety of trees and shrubs which are displayed in them. A good deal, no doubt, depends on the character of the ground, the distance, and the arrangement; but still, the grand source of the beauty and interest, when to many are botanists and arboriculturists, is the number of species and varieties.

We must now stady not only to display in oar grounds the picturesque, but the gardenesqae; and, accordingly, there is scarcely a limit to the variety that may be introduced, and that with admirable effect. One word here regarding this subject It is for gentlemen and gardening ladies to bring about reform; they have only to insist on planting collections, instead of a few kinds forever repeated. This will effect a double good; it will establish arboreturns, and add immensely to their interest; and it will render necessary the propagation of a great number of species and varieties in nurseries, which will greatly increase the business.