Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 April 1890 — Dwarf Trees of Japan. [ARTICLE]

Dwarf Trees of Japan.

One of the interesting thipgs seen at the Paris exposition are thh dwarf trees which the Japanese horticulturists are showing, and which attracting much attention. Pines, thujes, and cedars, said to be 100 or 150 years old, are only eighteen inches high, and with such specimens it would be easy to have a coniferous forest on a balcony. These arboreal deformities are produced by great labor, and if the truth is told about their ages, this work of arresting the tree’s development and forcing it Into contorted forms must be persisted in by several generations of foresters. All this painstaking is hardly paid for by the beauty of the resulting abortions, but a look at these trees will explain where the fantastic forms come from which serve as models for the plants we see on the lacquered trays, bronzes. and embroideries which come “TT"-