92 HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS. 



about it. It may be only the old apple tree standing 

 near the cottage door, scattering its blossoms over the 

 threshold in spring-time, and later dropping the mellow 

 fruit in the well-trodden pathway ; or, perhaps, the 

 group of elms and maples that throw their shadows 

 across the dooryard lawn, and through whose canopy of 

 green leaves children have watched the stars. Like hills 

 and mountains, the presence of trees stimulates the affec- 

 tions, brightens the fancy, kindles the imagination, and 

 increases the love of home and country. Few poets are 

 found in a treeless country, and most of the old homes 

 that have been kept in the same family, generation after 

 generation, are those to which trees have added their 

 greatest charm. 



You go to the AYOods even for the fall enjoyment of 

 the physical senses — smell, and sight, and sound. There 

 the strong health-giving breath of the conifera is min- 

 gled with the delicate, sweet odor of the violet and 

 arbutus ; there only can you look into the blue eyes of 

 the Hepatica or find the rose-tinted flowering Avinter- 

 green and the white a.nd pink blossoms of the Mitchella 

 — little flowers that fill the mind with an exquisite and 

 unspeakable pleasure. In no other place will you hear 

 in their perfection the sweetest of all music, the songs 

 of the wood and hermit thrushes and the wild vibrating 

 lyric of the winter w^ren. Nectar and ambrosia, drink 

 and food of the gods, were supposed to be products of 

 the woods. 



To the student naturalist, trees are especially interest- 

 ing, as they contain the elements of many sciences. 



