The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 06, No. 35, September, 1860. Various
Hemlock is unknown as a shade-tree; it is seldom seen by the road-side, except on the edge of a wood, and not often in cultivated grounds. The want of success usually attending the transplantation of it from the woods has prevented the general adoption of it as an ornamental tree. The Hemlock, when transplanted from the wood, is almost sure to perish; for Nature will not allow it to be desecrated by any association with Art. She reserves it for her own demesnes; and if you would possess one, you must go to its native spot and plant your garden around it, and take heed, lest, by disturbing its roots, you offend the deity who protects it. Some noble Hemlocks are occasionally seen in rude situations, where the cultivator's art has not interrupted their spontaneous growth; and the poet and the naturalist are inspired with a more pleasing admiration of their beauty, because they have seen them only where the solitary birds sing their wild notes, and where the heart is unmolested by the crowding tumult of human settlements.
The Pitch Pine has neither grace nor elegance, and though it is allied botanically to the pyramidal trees, it approaches the shape of the round-headed trees. There is a singular ruggedness about it; and when bristling all over with the stiff foliage that sometimes covers it from the extremities of the branches down almost to the roots, it cannot fail to attract observation. Trees of this species, for the most part too rough and homely to please the eye, are not generally valued as objects in the landscape; but there is a variety in their shape that makes amends for their want of comeliness, and gives them a marked importance. We do not in general sufficiently appreciate the value of homely objects among the scenes of Nature,—which are, indeed, the ground-work of all charming scenery, and set off to advantage the beauty of more comely things. They prepare us, by increasing our susceptibility, to feel more keenly the force of beauty in other objects. They give rest and relief to the eye, after it has experienced the stimulating effects of beautiful forms and colors, which would soon pall upon the sense; and they are interesting to the imagination, by leaving it free to dress the scene with the wreaths of fancy.
It is from these reflections that I have been led to prize many a homely tree as possessing a high value, by exalting the impressions of beauty which we derive from other trees, and by relieving Nature of that monotony which would attend a scene of unexceptional beauty. This monotony is apparent in almost all dressed grounds of considerable extent. We soon become entirely weary of the ever-flowing lines of grace and elegance, and the harmonious blending of forms and colors introduced by art. On the same principle we may explain the difficulty of reading with attention a whole volume on one subject, written in verse. We are soon weary of luxuries; and when we have been strolling in grounds laid out with gaudy flower-beds, the tired eye, when we go out into the fields, rests with serene delight upon rough pastures bounded by stone walls, and hills clothed with lichens and covered with boulders.
The homely Pitch Pine serves this important purpose of relief in the landscapes of Nature. Trees of this species are abundant in sandy levels, in company with the slender and graceful White Birch, "The Lady of the Woods," as the poet Coleridge called it. From these Pines proceed those delightful odors which are wafted to our windows by a mild south wind, not less perceptible in winter than in summer, and which are in a different manner as charming as a beautiful prospect.
The Juniper, or Red Cedar, known in some places as the Savin, is another homely tree that gives character to New England scenery. It is one of the most frequent accompaniments of the bald hills near certain parts of our coast, giving them a peculiar aspect of desolation. This tree acquires larger dimensions and a fuller and fairer shape in the Middle and Southern States. There the Junipers are beautiful trees, having a finer verdure than they ever acquire at the North. But the Juniper, with all its imperfections, its rugged form, and its inferior verdure, is not to be contemned; and it possesses certain qualities and features which ought to be prized hardly less than beauty. Its sombre ferruginous green adds variety to our wood-scenery at all times, and by contrast serves to make the foliage of other trees the more brilliant and conspicuous. In the latter part of summer, when the woods have acquired a general uniformity of verdure, the Junipers enliven the face of Nature by blending their duller tints with the fading hues of the fully ripened foliage. Thus will an assemblage of brown and gray clouds soften and at the same time enliven the deep azure of the heavens.
In this sketch, I have omitted to describe many important trees, especially those which have but little individuality of character, leaving them to be the subject of another essay concerning Trees in Assemblages. I have likewise said nothing here of those species which are commonly distinguished as flowering trees. But I must not omit, while speaking of the pyramidal trees, to say a word concerning the Larch, which has some striking points of form and habit. Like the Southern Cypress, it differs in its deciduous character from other coniferous trees: hence both are distinguished by the brilliancy of their verdure in the early part of summer, when the other evergreens are particularly sombre; but they are leafless in the winter. The Larch is beautifully pyramidal in its shape when young. In the vigor of its years it tends to uniformity, and to variety when it is old. Indeed, an aged Larch is often as rugged and fantastic as an old Oak. The American and European Larches differ only in the longer flowing foliage and the larger cones of the latter. Among the minor beauties of both species may be mentioned the bright crimson cones that appear in June and resemble clusters of fruit. The Larch is a Northern tree, being in its perfection in the latitude of Maine. It seems to delight in the coldest situations, and, like the Southern Cypress, is found chiefly in low swamps.
There are not many trees that assume the shape of an obelisk, or a long spire; but Nature, who presents to our eyes an ever-charming variety of forms as well as hues, in the objects of her creation, has given us the figure of the obelisk in the Chinese Juniper, in the Balsam Fir, in the Arbor-Vitæ, and lastly in the Lombardy Poplar, which may be offered to exemplify this class of forms. The Lombardy Poplar is interesting to thousands who were familiar with it in their youth, as an ornament to road-sides and village inclosures. It was formerly a favorite shade-tree, and still retains its privileges in many old-fashioned places. A century ago great numbers of Poplars were planted on the village way-sides, in front of dwelling-houses, on the borders of public grounds, and particularly on the sides of lanes and avenues leading to houses situated at a short distance from the high-road. Hence a row of these trees becomes suggestive at once of the approach to some old mansion or country-seat, which has now, perhaps, been converted into a farm-house, having exchanged its proud honors of wealth for the more simple and delightful appurtenances of rustic independence.
Some of these ancient rows of Poplars are occasionally seen in old fields, where almost all traces of the habitation which they were intended to grace are obliterated. There is a melancholy pleasure in surveying these humble ruins, whose history would illustrate the domestic habits of our ancestors. The cellar of the old house is now a part of the pasture-land, and its form can be traced by the simple swelling of the turf. Sumachs and Cornel-bushes have usurped the place of the exotic shrubbery in the old garden; and the only ancient companions of the Poplars, now remaining, are here and there a straggling Lilac or Currant-bush, a tuft of Houseleek, and perhaps, under the shelter of some dilapidated wall, the White Star of Bethlehem is seen meekly glowing in the rude society of the wild-flowers.
The Lombardy Poplar, which was formerly a favorite way-side ornament, a sort of idol of the public, and, like many another idol, exalted to honors that exceeded its merits, fell suddenly into unpopularity and disgrace. After having been admired and valued as if its leaves were all emeralds and its buds apples of gold, it was spurned and ridiculed and everywhere cut down as a cumberer of the ground. The faults attributed to it did not belong to the tree, but were the effects of the climate into which it had been removed. It was brought from the sunny vales of Italy, where it had been delicately reared by the side of the Orange and the Myrtle, and transplanted into the cold climate of New England. The tender constitution of this tree could not endure our rude winters; and every spring witnessed the decay of a large portion of its small branches. Hence it became prematurely aged, and in its decline carried with it the marks of its infirmities.
But, with all these imperfections, the Lombardy Poplar was more worthy of the honors it received from our predecessors than of its present disrepute. It is one of the fairest of trees, in the vigor of its health and the greenness of its youth. But nearly all the old Poplars are extirpated, and but few young trees are coming up to supply their places. While I am now writing, I see from my window the graceful spire