thought some of our best thoughts beneath them, as the moon's silvery light has sketched their forms upon the green at our feet. There is nothing monotonous in any single tree. Even the coniferous evergreens lose their dull tone and take on a warmer green, while every deciduous tree

THE STATELY WALNUT.

changes from glory as it develops with the season to its full-foliaged perfection. The birch never loses its delicate feminine charm, nor the beech its stateliness; the maple its cheerful sunny look, the hickory its nobility of expression, the elm its combined majesty and grace, nor the unwedgeable and gnarled oak its massive steadfastness. But

while these essential and invariable characteristics remain forever, the masses of foliage break into deeper shadows and more distinct outlines as May warms into June, so that every ridge and fluted column or smooth gray pole in forest and field seems to uphold a new tree every day.

A modern writer thus eloquently expresses himself on the subject:

"Do not.trees talk with their leafy lungs? Do they not at sunrise, when the wind is low and the birds are caroling their songs, play sweet music? Who has ever heard the soft whisper of young leaves in spring, on a sunny morning, that did not feel as if rainbow beams of gladness were running through his heart? And then, when the morning-glory, like a nun before God's holy altar, discloses her beauteous face, and the moss - roses open their crimson lips, sparkling with nectar that fell from heaven, who does not bless his Maker?"

And what eloquent mourners are not trees! The dense cone of the cypress overshadows mournfully the Moslem's tomb, with its sculptured turban, and the terebinth keeps watch by the Armenian's grave. Some nations love to weep with the weeping birch, the most beautiful of forest-trees, the lady of the woods, with "boughs so pendulous and fair," or with the willow of Babylon, on whose branches the captive Israelites hung up their harps. They love to look upon their long, thin leaves and branches, as they hang languidly down to the ground, or trail listlessly on the dark waters, waving full of sadness in the sighing breeze, and now floating in abandoned despair on the silent waves.

mythology, was the most favored of trees, because beneath a huge ash was held the solemn council of the gods. The summit of this remarkable tree reached the heavens, its branches spread over the entire earth, and its roots penetrated to the infernal regions. An eagle rested upon its summit and kept careful watch of whatever happened below. Huge serpents were coiled about its trunk. Two fountains sprung from its roots, in one of which was concealed Wisdom, and in the other Prophecy. The leaves of the tree were continually sprinkled with water from these fountains, and the tree itself was most carefully nurtured and guarded by the gods. From its wood the first man was formed, and breath was imparted to him as a special gift from them.

From the same source we learn that one of the wicked ancients shut up a real and beautiful goddess in a tree, where she talked and moaned and sang for many centuries, until one day a hero came along and split her out--a very commendable thing for him to do. Poetry tells us that in the dim lighted past every tree had a spirit lurking in its recesses; in the winter, down below the iron grasp of the frost king, it manipulated the spongiole roots; in the summer it whispered in every leaf, blushed in every blossom, and in the autumn rounded its delicious blood into plump or perfect fruit. This belief at least gave an individuality and meaning to the beauty and grandeur of trees, and a reality to the mystery of growth, which commonplace folk, having cast it away as heathenish, and not having accepted a belief in the universal presence of God in nature in its place, cannot understand. The majestic forests represent to them but so many cords of wood, undeveloped boards or oven stuff, which man is to bring into shape and sell, and the broad-branched elm, in all its lovely beauty, shades their land, and is a nuisance.

The mountain ash was regarded by the Druids as a powerful preservative agent against witchcraft. This superstition still prevails in some parts of England, the people often carrying sprigs of it about their persons to keep away the evil spirits. Some keep a bundle of ash twigs over the door of their cottages as a safeguard against harm, and the herdsmen used always to drive their cattle to and fro with ash rods, preserving the same one for many successive seasons if it brought no misfortune to their animals, and so proved itself to be a

"good-luck rod." In India, too, the same superstition exists to a great extent. There it is believed that the serpent has a great aversion for the ash, and that a decoction of ash leaves will kill the poison of a serpent's bite.

The Druids, of all religious people, yielded themselves most to the sacred influences of trees and forests. Their holy-tree was the branching oak (Quercus rolur), and in the depths of the primeval forests they set up those giant altars, which still stand, as at Stonehenge, a wonder to Lucan gives a sad-colored account of their ritual; but much allowance must be made, as he did not belong to their church.

men.

"Not far away, for ages past has stood An old, unviolated, sacred wood,

Whose gloomy boughs, that, interwoven, made A chilly, cheerless, everlasting shade; There, not the rustic gods nor satyrs sport, Nor fawns and sylvans with the nymphs resort, But barb'rous priests some dreadful power adore." These barbarous priests also taught that a mystic virtue lurked in green, bunchy mistletoe, which in the winter perfects its snow-white berries; and on the tenth day of March they kept "high festival and went in procession-priests, people, and two white bulls-to gather the tufted boughs; in white robes the priests cut them with the golden knife, and then they returned to sacrifices and feastings.”

The laurel-tree, among the ancient nations, was the token of victory. Generals and conquerors were crowned with laurel wreaths; soldiers, during the triumphal marches, carried sprigs of it; and the design of a laurel leaf, or the leaf itself, was considered as an emblem of some great conquest. To be crowned with the laurel wreath was considered to be so great an honor that it finally became the custom to confer this badge of distinction upon any who had distinguished themselves by their bravery and skill. Poets were included among those who were thus favored, and hence was derived the term of "Poet Laureate."

The yew-tree, the emblem of sadness and grief, which is mentioned by some of the earliest writers, has, in spite of its antiquity, but few legends connected with it. It is found principally in churchyards, from which fact it is but natural that the thought of gloom and sorrow should be associated with it:

"Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,— The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep."