J42 DISAPPEARANCE OF NATIVE TREES. 



Amidst the storm they sang, and the stars heard, and 



the sea, 

 And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang to the 



anthems of the free. 

 The ocean eagle soared from his nest by the white 



waves' foam, 

 And the rocking pines of the forest roar'd, this was their 



welcome home. 



These rocking pines of the forest sounded their 

 wild welcome even to the very verge of the ocean, 

 from which the " pilgrim fathers" landed, and be- 

 hind them rose a stately company of forest-trees, 

 crowding every hill and dale, whose rear was lost 

 in the far distant wilderness, and which extended 

 over a tract of land wide enough to comprise the 

 parent country, whence the " fathers" came, with 

 all its forests and vast plains, its peopled tracts, and 

 thronged cities. But now wild denuded hills and 

 contiguous arable levels meet the eye of the voya- 

 ger on first landing; the site of those vast primeval 

 forests, where the larch and pine once reigned in 

 umbrageous majesty, but from which they have 

 entirely disappeared. Even on the southern shores 

 of New England, stumps of the red cedar, and other 

 trees, are frequently dug up, which also refuse to vege- 

 tate, and could no more be made to grow there now, 

 than the palm or manchineel. The naturalist knows 

 not how to account for this curious fact, which can- 

 not as yet be solved on natural principles. It cannot 

 be attributed to the prevalence of winds bearing with 

 them saline particles, because those winds always 

 blew ; and the ocean has not changed its nature. 

 A poet, perhaps, would tell you, that they soon 

 learned to distrust the pilgrim fathers, whose 



