26 . NATURE-STUDY REVIEW [13:1— Jan., 1917 



red man, the deer, the panther, the wolves, and the forest; most 

 of all was he an enemy of the pines. I can see now over in 

 yonder field a row of the naked roots of my ancestors which man 

 dragged from the ground to fence his little fields; they are 

 still strong and undecayed though the rains of a hundred years 

 have whitened them. Look at those great bleaching roots and see 

 the foundations on which the pine trees build ! 



I am aged now, and mayhap soon this spot where I have stood 

 for more than two hundred years shall know me no more. But I 

 am not sad or lonely. Listen, I will tell you a secret: My old 

 heart is kept sweet and warm by the bees that have found there an 

 abiding place. My branches which have ever bowed in adoration 

 before the wind-god Ga-oh are stiff now and must break before his 

 majestic sway. But Ga-oh is the friend of the old pine as well as 

 the companion of his strength and he will soon lay me on the dear 

 earth whence I came. 



"The speckled sky is dim with snow 

 The light flakes falter and fall slow; 

 Athwart the hill-top, rapt and pale, 

 Silently drops a silvery veil ; 

 The far-off mountains mist}'- form 

 Is entering now a tent of storm; 

 And all the valley is shut in 

 By flickering curtains gray and thin. 

 But cheerily the chickadee 

 wSingeth to me on fence and tree; 

 The snow sails round him, as he sings. 

 White as the down on angel's wings." 



— /. T. Trowbridge. 



