48 THE PINE. 



in autumn, there is nothing else to attract the mere 

 collector into these solemn recesses. 



But for the contemplative and the poetic mind, 

 there is no more powerful influence than is found in 

 the pine-wood, and this at any season of the year. 

 In truth, the pine-wood is not a place wherein to 

 note seasons. It is independent of them ; present- 

 ing none of that sweet succession which makes 

 ever-changing picture-galleries of the meadows; 

 and except when the trees sustain their share of the 

 white wonder of winter, the aspect is perennially the 

 same. The pine- wood is always still. Therefore 

 we note in it more intensely than anywhere else, 

 that grand sound of the wind among the tops that 

 is so like ^the distant song of the sea. This cir- 

 cumstance has attracted the notice of observers 

 of nature in all ages. Theocritus, who wrote pasto- 

 rals more than 2000 years ago, commences one of 

 his poems with " Sweet is the murmur of the wind 

 among the pine-trees \" The poets of our own age 

 might be quoted a hundred times, in echo. Probably 

 the sound in question comes of the needle-like form 

 of the leaves, and of their infinite number, the wind 

 playing among them in a way that the broad flat 

 leaves of such trees as the oak cannot possibly 

 admit of. Then there the associations ; for a true 

 poet never rests in the sentiment of simple beauty 

 or the sense of awe, or of grandeur, or of duration. 

 His sympathies run immediately to things that con- 



