Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 225, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 September 1915 — HOME TOWN HELPS [ARTICLE]

HOME TOWN HELPS

AN o\fl BOXWOOD BORDER There Are Bome Survivals of Beautiful Garden Ornaments Still to Be Found. Time was when the boxwood border was considered the very top notch of frontyard garden ornamentation. And it was thought to be very beautiful when trimmed into fantastic shapes or clipped evenly in rectangular outline. Take almost any of the old time novels, and in them will appear a description of the boxwood borders running a perfectly straight line from the colonial porch to the front gate. Boxwood hall was a favorite name for many an old time home. The privet hedge has , largely usurped the place of the boxwood border, says the Newark (N. J.) News. The latter was such a slow grower. Years after it was out it seemed hardly larger than when first planted. But it didn’t send out impudent shoots in every direction; it grew slowly, sedately and in deliberately chosen directions. It was never in a hurry to be big. Boys may cut whips from an untrimmed privet hedge, but no one ever took such liberties with the dignified old boxwood bush. It did not promote corporal punishment. There * were two things about the boxwood border that none who are acquainted with it will ever forget; its dark green foliage, winter and summer, and its persistently unpleasant odor. The latter isn’t like that of birch, sassafras, sandalwood, willow, butternut or cedar. It is more like that of the simplocarpus fetidus —the skunk cabbage. But the box bush stands up as stiff and dignified as if it were disseminating the perfumes of Araby the blest.

Now and then some very fipe specimens of boxwood are found in this country, and wherever they are they point out a place having a history running back century or two. These bushes have not been clipped or otherwise mutilated since our grandfathers’ days, and have grown into great trees —that is, great for boxwood. Just such a bush was recently sighted near Mount Holly by a Long Island millionaire, and he paid a small fortune to have It removed to his estate. It was 12 feet high, more than 15 feet in diameter and with a great clump of clay attached to its ramified roots, weighed ten tons. It may live in its new home, but as a rule, these grand old box bushes resent removals after they are a hundred years old. A fine group of box bushes adorns the old Elias Boudiqot mansion on East Jersey street, Elizabeth, where both Washington and Lafayette were entertained in the old days. Four large bushes are still flourishing on the .Stoudinger property, 353 Broad street, corner of Clay, in Newark. The house was built in 1832, and the box must have been planted later, but each of the four specimens is at least ten feet high and as many in diameter. Large sums have been offered for them time and again, but have been refused. Doubtless there are many other fine specimens of the oldtime favorite box, but a large and shapely tree is still a valuable and cherished heritage.