460 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 19 3 8 



sole relic of a race threatened with extinction. Driven hither and 

 thither by adverse circumstances, this symbol of departed glory 

 eventually found a refuge in the Far East. It was not until the family 

 had been reduced to a few species and a single genus that man came 

 into the world, and in a later stage of his development assisted nature 

 by his care of one of her oldest treasures. 



Ginkgo has for centuries appealed to the imagination of the Oriental 

 mind: the tree with leaves like golden ducks' feet became an object of 

 veneration ; a legacy, it might be, from a golden age and as such posses- 

 sing miraculous power. We, despite our more matter-of-fact western 

 outlook, pay homage to the sacred tree of the East because its story, 

 written in the sands of time, gives us a vision of enduring life. The 

 maidenhair tree appeals to the historic soul: we see it as an emblem of 

 changelessness, a heritage from worlds of an age too remote for our 

 human intelligence to grasp, a tree which has in its keeping 



The secrets of the immeasurable past. 



