In Winter Quarters 



the elements; more attractive even in 

 their winter dishabille than when they 

 later don their catkins and lanceolated 

 foliage. The Salix outfit may not con- 

 tribute much to the lumber yard stocks 

 of the country, but they do give us 

 charcoal and look well either alive or 

 when blazing on a pair of andirons; 

 and the alba, a European importation, 

 with age develops a girth and shaggi- 

 ness that make it a distinguished figure 

 in any wood in which it may be found. 

 It gnarls and knots and besprouts its 

 various excrescences in a way that 

 should get the eyes of artists. There 

 are plenty of them in this neighbor- 

 hood willows, I mean; not our friends 

 of the Van Dyke beards who smoke 

 old pipes and wear long linen " dusters " 

 in their studios. A good one standing 

 just opposite my study window has a 

 hollow trunk that is a favorite refuge 

 for the squirrels when stray dogs send 

 them scampering up aloft with furi- 

 ously-beating hearts. 

 [108! 



