THE OLD AGE OF THE TREE. lia 
sively to the invisible giant of air, when the tall 
poplars come lowest of all, and feel, together 
with mighty ones of our own race in the whirl- 
winds of life, what a dangerous thing it is to 
carry it loftily in the world,—and to hear every 
now and then the crash which tells that some 
rotten-hearted member has been snapped off in 
the fight,—this is something worth experienc- 
ing ! 
Yet the Tree stands,—and lives a hale and 
vigorous tree still. Three hundred years agone 
old men out of the village used to come and poke 
the old trunk with their sticks, and prophesy, 
** Ay, ay, it couldn’t last much longer.” <A 
hundred years later, their children’s children, 
themselves white with age, used to do the same; 
and in their turn were laid in the grave. And 
now a hundred years later still, behold it living 
and strong, while the old men, and generation 
after generation of their descendants, are crumbled 
into dust, and their grave can scarcely be found 
in the moss-covered corner of the churchyard. 
That it is really and truly alive, the return of 
Spring will not suffer us to doubt. Green leaves, 
as fresh and young as ever dangled from _ its 
