While this labor is going on you can begin the planting of trees.
To this task I would earnestly ask careful attention. Your house
can be built in a summer; but it requires a good part of a century
to build the best trees into anything like perfection.
The usual tendency is to plant much too closely. Observe well-
developed trees, and see how wide a space they require. There is
naturally an eager wish for shade as soon as possible, and a
desire to banish from surroundings an aspect of bareness. These
purposes can, it is true, often be accomplished by setting out
more trees at first than could mature, and by taking out one and
another from time to time when they begin to interfere with each
other's growth. One symmetrical, noble tree, however, is certainly
worth more than a dozen distorted, misshapen specimens. If given
space, every kind of tree and shrub will develop its own
individuality; and herein lies one of their greatest charms. If
the oak typifies manhood, the drooping elm is equally suggestive
of feminine grace, while the sugar-maple, prodigal of its rich
juices, tasselled bloom, and winged seeds, reminds us of
wholesome, cheerful natures. Even when dying, its foliage takes on
the earliest and richest hues of autumn.
The trees about our door become in a sense our companions.
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