TREE FOKMS. 43 



extract from Grilpiii's description. He says :* ' I 

 shall conclude my account of deciduous trees with 

 the Larch, which is a kind of connecting species 

 between them and the race of evergreens. 

 Though it sheds its leaf with the former, it bears a 

 cone, is resinous, and ramifies like the latter.' 

 (He means like the conifers.) ' It claims the Alps 

 and Apennines for its native country, where it 

 thrives in higher regions of the air than any tree 

 of its consequence is known to do hanging over 

 rocks and precipices which have never been 

 visited by human feet. Often it is felled by the 

 Alpine peasant, and thrown athwart some 

 yawning chasm, where it affords a tremendous 

 passage from cliff to cliff, while the cataract, 

 roaring many fathoms below, is seen only in 

 surges of rising vapour.' Permeated with his 

 sometimes quaint, occasionally peculiar, but 

 always charming notions of the ' picturesque,' 

 Gilpin considers that the Larch is only ' fully 

 picturesque when the storms of many a century 

 have shattered its equal sides and given contrast 

 and variety to its boughs.' 



* ' Forest Scenery,' page 97. 



