CHAPTER VIII 



SOME TREE LORE 



*' If you could dance when Orpheus piped, 



Ye Oaks and Elms and Beeches, 

 Try when a man of modern time 



Your courtesy beseeches. 

 'Twas but his fancy ! Well, 'tis mine, 



So do your best endeavour: 

 The facts of History pass away, 



The thoughts may live for ever. 



* They move, they start, they thrill, they dance. 

 They shake their boughs with pleasure, 

 And flutter all their gay green leaves 



Obedient to the measure. 

 They choose their partners: Oak and Beech 



Pair off, a stately couple; 

 And Larch to Willow makes his bow, 

 Th' unbending to the supple." 



Charles Mackay : The Dance of the Trees. 



Legend tells us that in those far-away days of old, 

 trees walked and talked as well as thought, and 

 were much attracted by music. When Apollo 

 and Orpheus played the harp, trees and cattle came 

 together and crowded round them. Ovid writes: 

 " There was a hill, and upon the hill, a most level 

 space of a plain which the blades of grass made 

 green; all shade was wanting in the spot. After the 

 bard, sprung from the gods, had seated himself 

 in this place, and touched the strings, a shade came 

 over the spot. The tree of Chaonia was not absent, 



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