HEMLOCK SPRUCES 127 



of planting, or ever been called to repentance for 

 having planted. There is no more goodly tree in 

 Christendom. 



It would make an interesting incursion into the 

 realms of imagination to hazard an idea as to what 

 impressions a Hemlock Spruce would create in the 

 mind of anyone suddenly called into the presence 

 of tree-life for the first time and asked to dissociate 

 them one from another. If, for instance, they were 

 called in before the Flood, — a rather extreme meta- 

 morphic process once suggested by Voltaire — and 

 had placed before them branches, say, of a Hemlock, 

 Silver Fir, and Yew, for the purposes of dissociation, 

 generically and tribally, what opinion would they 

 form of their relative alikes and unalikes ? 



There may be said to be a certain rough-and-ready 

 resemblance between the leaves of the Hemlock and 

 those of the Silver Fir, since the leaf appearance of 

 the Hemlock has a look of a minuter edition of the 

 Silver Fir. That is a result which takes very little 

 disposing of to-day, but it might have taken longer 

 once, and not have been arrived at so easily. It 

 will be seen on closer inspection that — 



(i) The leaves of the Hemlock are mounted on 

 those same little projections that the 

 Spruces ' are, and the Silver Firs ' arising from 

 circular bases are not, as has been pointed 

 out on previous pages. 



(2) The bark of the Hemlock is red-brown, that 



of the Silver Fir of a grey colour. 



(3) The shape of the head of the tree and the 



foliage arrangement are more after the 

 manner of the generality of hard-wood 

 trees, and look as broad in effect as they are 

 high, while the Silver Fir towers to the 

 heavens with church-spire grandeur. The 



