The White Spruce is less common as an ornamental tree than the Norway
spruce, which is preferred as more rapid growing and stately. But the
points of difference seem to me very much in favor of the White Spruce.
We may distinguish them by the following marks. The White Spruce is not
so tall as the European tree, and its cones are very much smaller,
though both are pendent. But what is most remarkable is their different
mode of branching. The principal branches of each are given out at right
angles, with this apparent difference only, that the whorls are more
widely separated in the Norway spruce, the distance seeming to be
proportional to the comparative length or height of the trees. The
leaves of the Norway spruce grow only on the top and two sides of the
branch, those of the American spruce cover its whole circumference,
being almost cylindrical.
But the most remarkable difference is observed in the disposition of the
secondary branches. The Norway spruce suspends them almost
perpendicularly from its horizontal boughs. Those of the American tree
are tufted, not pendulous, but merely drooping a little at their
extremities. This gives the whole mass a more sturdy appearance, and
takes away some of that formality which is so tiresome in the Norway
spruce. For we should bear in mind, that, although hanging foliage is
supposed to be less formal than the opposite, it is not invariably so.
The drooping foliage of the elm and the hemlock is graceful, but that of
the Norway spruce resembles an artificial arrangement, and reminds me of
garments hanging upon a patent clothes-line. I think the tufted mode of
growth of the American spruces would be generally preferred to the
formal drooping foliage of the Norway spruce and European larch.