, PREFATORY 



Drat the trees, says I, to be sewer I haates 'em, my lass, 

 For we puts the muck o' the land, an' they sucks the muck fro* 

 the grass. 



Tennyson, The Village Wife. 



There are several inducements that have prompted 

 me to put together this little summarized table of the 

 chief characteristics of Conifers. In the first place I 

 was instigated to do so for my own personal edi- 

 fication. I found that, unless you were perpetually 

 in their midst, the various differences and char- 

 acteristics of trees were not quite so reproducible on 

 occasions as could be wished, and that often when 

 the moment came, the man, and his stores of ready 

 wit, were not forthcoming. Their little idiosyn- 

 crasies, sometimes even their very name, with which 

 in calmer moments you were perfectl}' acquainted, 

 had an evasive way of slipping both your mental 

 and vocal efforts. Sometimes these lapses of 

 memoria technica would be followed by a little door- 

 step wit, or some such method of recognition, of a 

 mere momentary nature, and afterwards made good 

 after a consultation in an up-to-date library, populous 

 with arboricultural works. 



If you are not out for effect, and effect with you 

 is not a primary consideration, why not let written 

 memoranda do some of the carrying trade of the 

 intelligence department ? You may lay yourself 

 open to the challenge that your hat (or in this case 

 your notebook) contains more than your head, a 

 suggestion from the audience that once a young 



