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THE ASH-TREE. 



THE fame of the Ash-tree reaches back to the remotest antiquity, the 

 wood having been used from time immemorial for spear-shafts and in 

 the construction of other weapons of war, whence its well-known 

 epithet the " martial." Strange that such a purpose should be 

 served by a tree the young branches of which are so brittle that they 

 snap like sealing-wax. The delicate and feminine beauty of the ash- 

 tree has also contributed to render it an object of frequent mention in 

 literature, as when Virgil commends it as the most graceful of trees, in 

 the often- quo ted line 



" In fraxhras pulcherrima sylvis." 



To English landscape the ash gives something of the character which 

 in warm countries is supplied by the Acacia. This comes of its 

 feathered leaves. The sunbeams filter perfectly through the foliage, 

 and thus we receive at all times that agreeable sense of lightness and 

 transparency which results from the sky being seen through a network 

 of twig and verdure. In its stature too, the ash commends itself, well- 

 grown individuals rising to the height of from eighty to a hundred feet. 

 It has been said, that while we instinctively most love that which v 

 is little, admiration fastens chiefly upon the great : I think it will 

 prove that we find our highest pleasure, after all, in contemplating that 

 which strikes us more particularly as lofty, of course with the idea of 

 symmetry combined. We give this meed of approval, as the sponta- 

 neous act of the soul, to the lily, to the aspiring palm, to the woman 

 who rises higher than her companions. Not that in so doing we 

 depreciate and disesteem the less, but that the tall takes the firmest 

 and deepest hold. It is a great point to be always invited, by the 

 stature of what surrounds us, to look upwards ; or at all events, not to 

 have our eyes habitually below the line of straight seeing. Our 

 physical nature and organization are the better for -such upward- 

 looking ; and a certain quiet satisfaction of spirit, felt, though inde- 



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