QUERCUS ALBA 



Following, season after season, new 

 recruits would come, did come; but 

 their advent was too late. Though 

 they could germinate in endless 

 cycle, there their effort would cease; 

 for now that which was their dead- 

 liest enemy, shade, had come, a 

 thing which to the forward was 

 good, for it prevented the evapora- 

 tion of life-giving moisture, but 

 which to the late arrival meant 

 death alone. Hitherto merely a pre- 

 lude, the real battle was now on. 



24 



