FOREST TREES. ]27 



ding three varieties, having narrow and deep- 

 green leaves, and distinguished from each other 

 by the light-brown, or red, or sable hue of their 

 cones. Beside them, often springs the hum- 

 ble Pinus balsamea, or Hemlock Fir, and the tall 

 Swamp Pine, in striking contrast to the trembling 

 Maple and the Ash. Far, too, as the eye can reach, 

 extend vast forests of the Larch; that beautiful 

 tree, which artists, from the time of Pliny to that 

 of Raphael, styled the immortal wood, and painted 

 on it their most valuable productions. Who, look- 

 ing from an eminence into the depths of those vast 

 forests, where the gray and often lichen-tinted trunks 

 of innumerable trees rise like columns, does not ob- 

 serve the exquisite variety afforded by the blue, and 

 white, and red, the crimson, and pale pink, blossoms 

 of different kinds of larch, that appear in mingled 

 beauty on the gently-undulating branches, now 

 quivering in the sunbeam, and now throwing their 

 dancing lights and shadows on the earth ? Oaks, 

 too, are there ; cedars of stately growth, as ancient, 

 perhaps, and as umbrageous, as those of Lebanon ; 

 walnuts, and beech-trees in groups, with elms and 

 poplars, resembling those of Britain ; one rising like 

 a pyramid of verdure, the other trembling in every 

 passing breeze. Birds of various kinds delight to 

 harbour among them, and such aged elms as have 

 become hollow during the lapse of years, afford a 

 shelter in November to wild cats and bears, which 

 remain there till April. Indian hunters penetrate 

 far into the forests, not only to seek for game, but 

 also to procure the bark of the red elm, which they 

 sew together with the inner rind, and fix to ribs 



