THE LOCUST. 



THE waysides in the Middle States do not contain a 

 more beautiful tree than the Locust, with its profusion of 

 pinnate leaves and racemes of flowers that fill the air 

 with the most agreeable odors. In New England the 

 Locust is subject to the ravages of so many different 

 insects that it is commonly stinted in its growth, its 

 branches withered and broken, and its symmetry destroyed. 

 But the deformities produced by the decay of some of 

 its important limbs cannot efface the charm of its fine 

 pensile foliage. In winter it seems devoid of all those 

 proportions we admire in other trees. It rears its tall 

 form, withered, shapeless, and deprived of many valuable 

 parts, without proportional breadth, and wanting in any 

 definite character of outline. Through all the early 

 weeks of spring we might still suppose it would never 

 recover its beauty. But May hangs on those withered 

 boughs a green drapery that hides all their deformity ; 

 she infuses into their foliage a perfection of verdure that 

 no other tree can rival, and a beauty in the forms of its 

 leaves that renders it one of the chief ornaments of 

 the groves and waysides. June weaves into this green 

 leafage pendent clusters of flowers of mingled brown and 

 white, filling the air with fragrance, and enticing the bee 

 with odors as sweet as from groves of citron and myrtle. 



The finely cut and delicate foliage of the Locust and 

 its jewelled white flowers, hanging gracefully among its 

 dark green leaves, yield it a peculiar style of beauty, and 

 remind us of some of the finer vegetation of the tropics. 



