234 IN PRAISE OF THE WE YMO UTII PINE. 



faster since it was cut down than ever it did 

 while standing. I care not to argue the 

 point. Rather, let me be glad that a tree 

 is a tree, whether large or small. What a 

 wonder of wonders it would seem to unac- 

 customed eyes ! As some lover of imagina- 

 tive delights wished that he could forget 

 Shakespeare and read him new, so I would 

 cheerfully lose all memory of my king of 

 Weymouth pines, if by that means I might 

 for once look upon a tree as upon something 

 I had never seen or dreamed of. 



For that purpose, were it given me to 

 choose, I would have one that had grown 

 by itself ; full of branches on all sides, but 

 with no suggestion of primness ; in short, a 

 perfect tree, a miracle hardly to be found 

 in any forest, since the forest would be no 

 better than a park if the separate members 

 of it were allowed room to develop each af- 

 ter its own law. Nature is too cunning an 

 artist to spoil the total effect of her picture 

 by too fond a regard for the beauty of par- 

 ticular details. 



I once passed a lazy, dreamy afternoon in 

 a small clearing on a Canadian mountain- 

 side, where the lumbermen had left standing 



