But leaves of a green verging on yellow when they reflect the atmosphere do not produce a reflection verging on blue, inasmuch as every thing which appears in a mirror takes some colour from that mirror, hence the blue of the atmosphere being reflected in the yellow of the leaf appears green, because blue and yellow mixed together make a very fine green colour, therefore the lustre of light leaves verging on yellow will be greenish yellow.
A classification of trees according to their colours.
The trees in a landscape are of various kinds of green, inasmuch as some verge towards blackness, as firs, pines, cypresses, laurels, box and the like. Some tend to yellow such as walnuts, and pears, vines and verdure. Some are both yellowish and dark as chesnuts, holm-oak. Some turn red in autumn as the service-tree, pomegranate, vine, and cherry; and some are whitish as the willow, olive, reeds and the like. Trees are of various forms ...
The proportions of light and shade in trees (436-440).
OF A GENERALLY DISTRIBUTED LIGHT AS LIGHTING UP TREES.
That part of the trees will be seen to lie in the least dark shadow which is farthest from the earth.
To prove it let _a p_ be the tree, _n b c_ the illuminated hemisphere [the sky], the under portion of the tree faces the earth _p c_, that is on the side _o_, and it faces a small part of the hemisphere at _c d_. But the highest part of the convexity a faces the greatest part of the hemisphere, that is _b c_. For this reason--and because it does not face the darkness of the earth--it is in fuller light. But if the tree has dense foliage, as the laurel, arbutus, box or holm oak, it will be different; because, although _a_ does not face the earth, it faces the dark [green] of the leaves cut up by many shadows, and this darkness is reflected onto the under sides of the leaves immediately above. Thus these trees have their darkest shadows nearest to the middle of the tree.
The shadows of verdure are always somewhat blue, and so is every shadow of every object; and they assume this hue more in proportion as they are remote from the eye, and less in proportion as they are nearer. The leaves which reflect the blue of the atmosphere always present themselves to the eye edgewise.