monument, which is also a beneficence to all mankind, in the great
volumes of his "Silva of North America," lives not far from Boston, and
he loves especially that jewel of the apple family which, for want of a
common name, I must designate scientifically as _Pyrus floribunda_. On
his own magnificent estate, as well as at the Arboretum, this superb
shrub or small tree riots in rosy beauty in early spring. While the
leaves do come with these flowers, they are actually crowded back out of
apparent sight by the straight wands of rose-red blooms, held by the
twisty little tree at every angle and in indescribable beauty. If the
visitor saw nothing but this Floribunda apple--"abundant flowering" sure
enough--on his pilgrimage, he might well be satisfied, especially if he
then and there resolved to see it again, either as he planted it at home
or journeyed hither another spring for the enlargement of his soul.
There are other of these delightful crabs or apples to be
enjoyed--Ringo, Kaido, Toringo--nearly all of Japanese origin, all of
distinct beauty, and all continuing that beauty in handsome but inedible
fruits that hang most of the summer. My tree-loving friends can well
study these, and, I hope, plant them, instead of repeating continually
the monotonously familiar shrubs and trees of ordinary commerce.
But I have not spoken enough of one notable feature of the every-day
apple tree that we may see without a journey to the East. The fully set
fruiting branch of an apple tree in health and vigor, properly nurtured
and protected against fungous disease by modern "spraying," is a thing
of beauty in its form and color. See those deep red Baldwins shine
overhead in the frosty air of early fall; note the elegance of form and
striping on the leathery-skinned Ben Davis; appreciate true apples of
gold set in green enamel on a tree of the sunny Bellefleur! These in the
fall; but it is hardly full summer before the closely set branches of
Early Harvest are as beautiful as any orange-tree, or the more upright
Red Astrachan is ablaze with fruit of red and yellow. Truly, an apple
orchard might be arranged to give a series of pictures of changing
beauty of color and growth from early spring until fall frost, and then
to follow with a daily panorama of form and line against snow and sky
until the blossoms peeped forth again. Let us learn, if we do not
already love the apple tree, to love it for its beauty all the year!
[Illustration]
Willows and Poplars
"By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we
remembered Zion. Upon the willows in the midst thereof we hanged our
harps." Thus sang the Psalmist of the sorrows of the exiles in Babylon,
and his song has fastened the name of the great and wicked city upon one
of the most familiar willows, while also making it "weep"; for the
common weeping willow is botanically named _Salix Babylonica_.
It may be that the forlorn Jews did hang their harps upon the tree we
know as the weeping willow, that species being credited to Asia as a
place of origin; but it is open to doubt, for the very obvious reason
that the weeping willow is distinctly unadapted to use as a harp-rack,
and one is at a loss to know just how the instruments in question would
have been hung thereon. It is probable that the willows along the rivers
of Babylon were of other species, and that the connection of the city
of the captivity and the tears of the exiles with the long, drooping
branches of the noble tree which has thus been sorrowfully named was a
purely sentimental one. Indeed, the weeping willow is also called
Napoleon's willow, because the great Corsican found much pleasure in a
superb willow of the same species which stood on the lonely prison isle
of St. Helena, and from twigs of which many trees in the United States
have been grown.
The willow family presents great contrasts, both physical and
sentimental. It is a symbol both of grief and of grace. The former
characterization is undoubtedly because of the allusion of the one
hundred and thirty-seventh Psalm, as quoted above, thoughtlessly
extended through the centuries; and the latter, as when a beautiful and
slender woman is said to be of "willowy" form, obviously because of the
real grace of the long, swinging wands of the same tree. I might hint
that a better reason for making the willow symbolize grief is because
charcoal made from its twigs and branches is an important and almost
essential ingredient of gunpowder, through which a sufficiency of grief
has undoubtedly entered the world!
Willow twigs seem the very essence of fragility, as they break from the
parent tree at a touch; and yet one of the willows furnishes the tough,
pliable and enduring withes from which are woven the baskets of the
world. The willows, usually thin in branch, sparse of somewhat pale
foliage, of so-called mournful mien, are yet bursting with vigor and
life; indeed, the spread and the value of the family is by reason of
this tenacity and virility, which makes a broken twig, floating on the
surface of a turbid stream, take root and grow on a sandy bank where
nothing else can maintain itself, wresting existence and drawing
strength and beauty from the very element whose ravages of flood and
current it bravely withstands.
Apparently ephemeral in wood, growing quickly and perishing as quickly,
the willows nevertheless supply us with an important preservative
element, extracted from their bitter juices. Salicylic acid, made from
willow bark, prevents change and arrests decay, and it is an important
medical agent as well.
[Illustration: A weeping willow in early spring]
Flexible and seemingly delicate as the little tree is when but just
established, there is small promise of the rugged and sturdy trunk that
in a few years may stand where the chance twig lodged. And the color of
the willows--ah! there's a point for full enthusiasm, for this family of
grief furnishes a cheerful note for every month in the year, and runs
the whole scale of greens, grays, yellows and browns, and even adds to
the winter landscape touches of blazing orange and bright red across the
snow. Before ever one has thought seriously of the coming of spring, the
long branchlets of the weeping willow have quickened into a hint of
lovely yellowish green, and those same branchlets will be holding their
green leaves against a wintry blast when most other trees have given up
their foliage under the frost's urgency. Often have the orange-yellow
twigs of the golden osier illumined a somber countryside for me as I
looked from the car window; and close by may be seen other willow bushes
of brown, green, gray, and even purple, to add to the color compensation
of the season. Then may come into the view, as one flies past, a great
old weeping willow rattling its bare twigs in the wind; and, if a stream
is passed, there are sure to be seen on its banks the sturdy trunks of
the white and the black willows at least. Think of an average landscape
with the willows eliminated, and there will appear a great vacancy not
readily filled by another tree.
The weeping willow has always made a strong appeal to me, but never one
of simple grief or sorrow. Its expression is rather of great dignity,
and I remember watching in somewhat of awe one which grew near my
childhood's home, as its branches writhed and twisted in a violent
rain-storm, seeming then fairly to agonize, so tossed and buffeted were
they by the wind. But soon the storm ceased, the sun shone on the
rounded head of the willow, turning the raindrops to quickly vanishing
diamonds, and the great tree breathed only a gentle and benignant peace.
When, in later years, I came to know the moss-hung live-oak of the
Southland, the weeping willow assumed to me a new dignity and value in
the northern landscape, and I have strongly resented the attitude of a
noted writer on "Art Out of Doors" who says of it: "I never once have
seen it where it did not hurt the effect of its surroundings, or at
least, if it stood apart from other trees, where some tree of another
species would not have looked far better." One of the great merits of
the tree, its difference of habit, its variation from the ordinary, is
thus urged against it.
[Illustration: The weeping willow in a storm]
I have spoken of the basket willow, which is scientifically _Salix
viminalis_, and an introduction from Europe, as indeed are many of the
family. In my father's nursery grew a great patch of basket willows,
annually cut to the ground to make a profusion of "sprouts," from which
were cut the "tying willows" used to bind firmly together for shipment
bundles of young trees. It was an achievement to be able to take a
six-foot withe, and, deftly twisting the tip of it under the heel to a
mass of flexible fiber, tie this twisted portion into a substantial
loop; and to have this novel wooden rope then endure the utmost pull of
a vigorous man, as he braced his feet against the bundle of trees in
binding the withe upon it, gave an impression of anything but weakness
on the part of the willow.
Who has not admired the soft gray silky buds of the "pussy" willow,
swelling with the spring's impulse, and ripening quickly into a "catkin"
loaded with golden pollen? Nowadays the shoots of this willow are
"forced" into bud by the florists, and sold in the cities in great
quantities; but really to see it one must find the low tree or bush by a
stream in the woods, or along the roadside, with a chance to note its
fullness of blossom. It is finest just when the hepaticas are at their
bluest on the warm hillsides; and, one sunny afternoon of a spring
journey along the north branch of the Susquehanna river, I did not know
which of the two conspicuous ornaments of the deeply wooded bank made me
most anxious to jump from the too swiftly moving train.
This pussy-willow has pleasing leaves, and is a truly ornamental shrub
or small tree which will flourish quite well in a dry back yard, as I
have reason to know. One bright day in February I found a pussy-willow
tree, with its deep purple buds showing not a hint of the life within.
The few twigs brought home quickly expanded when placed in water, and
gave us their forecast of the spring. One twig was, out of curiosity,
left in the water after the catkins had faded, merely to see what would
happen. It bravely sent forth leaves, while at the base little white
rootlets appeared. Its vigor appealing to us, it was planted in an arid
spot in our back yard, and it is now, after a year and a half, a
handsome, slender young tree that will give us a whole family of silken
pussy-buds to stroke and admire another spring.
[Illustration: A pussy-willow in a park]
This same little tree is called also the glaucous willow, and it is
botanically _Salix discolor_. It is more distinct than some others of
the family, for the willow is a great mixer. The tree expert who will
unerringly distinguish between the red oak and the scarlet oak by the
precise angle of the spinose margins of the leaves (how I admire an
accuracy I do not possess!) will balk at which is crack willow, or white
willow, or yellow or blue willow. The abundant vigor and vitality and
freedom of the family, and the fact that it is of what is known as the
dioecious habit--that is, the flowers are not complete, fertile and
infertile flowers being borne on separate trees--make it most ready to
hybridize. The pollen of the black willow may fertilize the flower of
the white willow, with a result that certainly tends to grayness on the
worrying head of the botanist who, in after years, is trying to locate
the result of the cross!
[Illustration: Blossoms of the white willow]
There is much variety in the willow flowers--and I wonder how many
observers really notice any other willow "blossoms" than those of the
showy pussy? A superb spring day afield took me along a fascinatingly
crooked stream, the Conodoguinet, whose banks furnish a congenial and as
yet protected (because concealed from the flower-hunting vandal) home
for wild flowers innumerable and most beautiful, as well as trees that
have ripened into maturity. An earlier visit at the time the bluebells
were ringing out their silent message on the hillside, in exquisite
beauty, with the lavender phlox fairly carpeting the woods, gave a
glimpse of some promising willows on the other side of the stream.
Twilight and letters to sign--how hateful the desk and its work seem in
these days of springing life outside!--made a closer inspection
impossible then, but a golden Saturday afternoon found three of us, of
like ideals, hastening to this tree and plant paradise. A mass of soft
yellow drew us from the highway across a field carpeted thickly with
bluet or "quaker lady," to the edge of the stream, where a continuous
hum showed that the bees were also attracted. It was one splendid willow
in full bloom, and I could not and as yet cannot safely say whether it
is the crack willow or the white willow; but I can affirm of a certainty
that it was a delight to the eye, the mind and the nostrils. The extreme
fragility of the smaller twigs, which broke away from the larger limbs
at the lightest shake or jar, gave evidence of one of Nature's ways of
distributing plant life; for it seems that these twigs, as I have
previously said, part company with the parent tree most readily, float
away on the stream, and easily establish themselves on banks and bars,
where their tough, interlacing roots soon form an almost impregnable
barrier to the onslaught of the flood. Only a stone's throw away there
stood a great old black willow, with a sturdy trunk of ebon hue, crowned
with a mass of soft green leafage, lighter where the breeze lifted up
the under side to the sunlight. Many times, doubtless, the winds had
shorn and the sleet had rudely trimmed this old veteran, but there
remained full life and vigor, even more attractive than that of youth.
Most of the willows are shrubs rather than trees, and there are endless
variations, as I have before remarked. Further, the species belonging at
first in the Eastern Hemisphere have spread well over our own side of
the globe, so that it seems odd to regard the white willow and the
weeping willow as foreigners. At Niagara Falls, in the beautiful park on
the American side, on the islands amid the toss of the waters, there are
many willows, and those planted by man are no less beautiful than those
resulting from Nature's gardening. In spring I have had pleasure in some
splendid clumps of a form with lovely golden leaves and a small, furry
catkin, found along the edge of the American rapids. I wonder, by the
way, how many visitors to Niagara take note of the superb collection of
plants and trees there to be seen, and which it is a grateful relief to
consider when the mind is wearied with the majesty and the vastness of
Nature's forces shown in the cataract? The birds are visitors to Goat
Island and the other islets that divide the Niagara River, and they have
brought there the plants of America in wonderful variety.
[Illustration: A white willow in a characteristic position]
There is one willow that has been used by the nurserymen to produce a
so-called weeping form, which, like most of these monstrosities, is not
commendable. The goat willow is a vigorous tree introduced from Europe,
having large and rather broad and coarse leaves, dark green above and
whitish underneath. It is taken as a "stock," upon which, at a
convenient height, the skilled juggler with trees grafts a drooping or
pendulous form known as the Kilmarnock willow, thus changing the habit
of the tree so that it then "weeps" to the ground. Fortunately, the
original tree sometimes triumphs, the graft dies, and a lusty goat
willow rears a rather shapely head to the sky.
This Kilmarnock willow is a favorite of the peripatetic tree agent, and
I have enjoyed hugely one notable evidence of his persuasive eloquence
to be seen in a Lebanon Valley town, inhabited by the quaint folk known
as Pennsylvania Germans. All along the line of the railroad traversing
this valley may be seen these distorted willows decorating the prim
front yards, and they are not so offensive when used with other shrubs
and trees. In this one instance, however, the tree agent evidently found
a customer who was persuaded that if one Kilmarnock willow was a good
thing to have, a dozen of them was twelve times better; wherefore his
dooryard is grotesquely adorned with that many flourishing weepers,
giving an aspect that is anything but decorous or solemn. Some time the
vigilance of the citizen will be relaxed, it may be hoped; he will
neglect to cut away the recurring shoots of the parent trees, and they
will escape and destroy the weeping form which provides so much
sarcastic hilarity for the passers-by.
The willow, with its blood relation, the poplar, is often "pollarded,"
or trimmed for wood, and its abundant vigor enables it to recover from
this process of violent abbreviation more satisfactorily than do most
trees. The result is usually a disproportionately large stem or bole,
for the lopping off of great branches always tends to a thickening of
the main stem. The abundant leafage of both willow and poplar soon
covers the scars, and there is less cause to mourn than in the case of
maples or other "hard-wooded" trees.
If my readers will only add a willow section to their mental observation
outfit, there will be much more to see and appreciate. Look for and
enjoy in the winter the variation in twig color and bark hue; notice how
smoothly lies the covering on one stem, all rugged and marked on
another. In the earliest spring examine the swelling buds, of widely
differing color and character, from which shortly will spring forth the
catkins or aments of bloom, followed by the leaves of varied colors in
the varied species, and with shapes as varied. Vivid green, soft gray,
greenish yellow; dull surface and shining surface above, pale green to
almost pure white beneath; from the long and stringy leaf of the weeping
willow to the comparatively broad and thick leaf of the
pussy-willow--there is variety and interest in the foliage well worth
the attention of the tree-lover. When winter comes, there will be
another set of contrasts to see in the way the various species lose
their leaves and get ready for the rest time during which the buds
mature and ripen, and the winter colors again shine forth.
[Illustration: Clump of young white willows]
These observations may be made anywhere in America, practically, for the
willow is almost indifferent to locality, growing everywhere that its
far-reaching roots can find the moisture which it loves, and which it
rapidly transpires to the thirsty air. As Miss Keeler well remarks, "The
genus Salix is admirably fitted to go forth and inhabit the earth, for
it is tolerant of all soils and asks only water. It creeps nearer to the
North Pole than any other woody plant except its companion the birch. It
trails upon the ground or rises one hundred feet in the air. In North
America it follows the water-courses to the limit of the temperate zone,
enters the tropics, crosses the equator, and appears in the mountains of
Peru and Chili.... The books record one hundred and sixty species in the
world, and these sport and hybridize to their own content and to the
despair of botanists. Then, too, it comes of an ancient line; for
impressions of leaves in the cretaceous rocks show that it is one of the
oldest of plants."
Common it is, and therefore overlooked; but the reader may well resolve
to watch the willow in spring and summer, with its bloom and fruit; to
follow its refreshing color through winter's chill; to observe its cheer
and dignity; and to see the wind toss its slender wands and turn its
graceful leaves.
The poplars and the willows are properly considered together, for
together they form the botanical world family of the _Salicaceae_. Many
characteristics of bloom and growth, of sap and bark, unite the two, and
surely both, though alike common to the world, are common and familiar
trees to the dwellers in North America.
[Illustration: White poplars in spring-time]
One of my earliest tree remembrances has to do with a spreading
light-leaved growth passed under every day on the way to school--and,
like most school-boys, I was not unwilling to stop for anything of
interest that might put off arrival at the seat of learning. This great
tree had large and peculiar winter buds, that always seemed to have
advance information as to the coming of spring, for they would swell out
and become exceedingly shiny at the first touch of warm sun. Soon the
sun-caressing would be responded to by the bursting of the buds, or the
falling away of their ingenious outer protecting scales, which dropped
to the ground, where, sticky and shining, and extraordinarily aromatic
in odor, they were just what a curious school-boy enjoyed investigating.
"Balm of Gilead" was the name that inquiry brought for this tree, and
the resinous and sweet-smelling buds which preceded the rather
inconspicuous catkins or aments of bloom seemed to justify the Biblical
designation.
Nearly a world tree is this poplar, which in some one of its variable
forms is called also tacamahac, and balsam poplar as well. Its cheerful
upright habit, really fine leaves and generally pleasing air commend it,
but there is one trouble--it is almost too vigorous and anxious to
spread, which it does by means of shoots or "suckers," upspringing from
its wide area of root-growth, thus starting a little forest of its own
that gives other trees but small chance. But on a street, where the
repression of pavements and sidewalks interferes with this exuberance,
the balsam poplar is well worth planting.
The poplars as a family are pushing and energetic growers, and serve a
great purpose in the reforestation of American acres that have been
carelessly denuded of their tree cover. Here the trembling aspen
particularly, as the commonest form of all is named, comes in to quickly
cover and shade the ground, and give aid to the hard woods and the
conifers that form the value of the forest growth.
This same American aspen, a consideration of the lightly hung leaves of
which has been useful to many poets, is a well-known tree of graceful
habit, particularly abundant in the forests north of Pennsylvania and
New Jersey, and occupying clearings plentifully and quickly. Its flowers
are in catkins, as with the rest of the family, and, like other poplars,
they are in two kinds, male and female, or staminate and pistillate,
which accounts for some troubles the inexperienced investigator has in
locating them.
There is another aspen, the large-toothed form, that is a distinct
botanical species; but I have never been able to separate it, wherefore
I do not try to tell of it here, lest I fall under condemnation as a
blind leader, not of the blind, but of those who would see!
In many cities, especially in cities that have experienced real-estate
booms, and have had "extensions" laid out "complete with all
improvements," there is to be seen a poplar that has the merit of quick
and pleasing growth and considerable elegance as well. Alas, it is like
the children of the tropics in quick beauty and quick decadence! The
Carolina poplar, it is called, being a variety of the wide-spread
cottonwood. Grow? All that is needed is to cut a lusty branch of it,
point it, and drive it into the earth--it will do the rest!
This means cheap trees and quick growth, and that is why whole new
streets in West Philadelphia, for instance, are given up to the Carolina
poplar. Its clear, green, shining leaves, of good size, coming early in
spring; its easily guided habit, either upright or spreading; its very
rapid growth, all commend it. But its coarseness and lack of real
strength, and its continual invitation to the tree-butcher and the
electric lineman, indicate the undesirability of giving it more than a
temporary position, to shade while better trees are growing.
[Illustration: The Carolina poplar as a street tree]