156 PROSERPINA. 



literally a ' truncated ' mass of timber, still bearing 

 irregular branches here and there, but inevitably 

 suggestive of resemblance to a human body, after 

 the loss of some of its limbs. 



And to prepare trees for their practical 

 service, what age and storm only do partially, 

 the first rough process of human art does com- 

 pletely. The branches are lopped away, leaving 

 literally the ' truncus ' as the part of the tree 

 out of which log and rafter can be cut. And 

 in many trees, it would appear to be the chief 

 end of their being to produce this part of their 

 body on a grand scale, and of noble substance ; 

 so that, while in thinking of vegetable life without 

 reference to its use to men or animals, we should 

 rightly say that the essence of it was in leaf and 

 flower — not in trunk or fruit ; yet for the sake 

 of ariimals, we find that some plants, like the 

 vine, are apparently meant chiefly to produce fruit ; 

 others, like laurels, chiefly to produce leaves ; 

 others chiefly to produce flowers ; and others to 

 produce permanently serviceable and sculpturable 

 wood ; or, in some cases, merely picturesque and 

 monumental masses of vegetable rock, " inter- 

 twisted fibres serpentine," — of far nobler and more 

 pathetic use in their places, and their enduring age, 

 than ever they could be for material purpose in 



