TREES. 



referable to arborescent plants, their size and extent 

 of leaf-surface being so prodigiously great, when com- 

 pared with that of the former kind. We little think 

 when we inhale the fresh air, and quaff it upon the 

 hills, like so much invisible and aerial wine, that its 

 purity and healthfulness come of the glorious trees. 

 But so it is. Nor have we merely the trees of our 

 own country to think of and be thankful to. The air 

 that we breathe in England to-day has been purified 

 for us perhaps a thousand miles away. If the wind 

 blow from the north, we may be grateful to the Scan- 

 dinavian birches ; if from the west, it is quite possible 

 that the magnolias of North America may have helped 

 to strain it ; if from the south, were it gifted with lan- 

 guage, we might hear a tale of Indian palms. Every 

 tree in nature makes itself felt in the good it does the 

 air, a beautiful return for the new loveliness it re- 

 ceives when its branches and foliage are stirred and 

 fluttered by the breeze. 



Trees supply man with every species of useful arti- 

 cle, whether of nourishment, or of clothing, or of 

 medicine, and with timber to construct dwellings, and 

 to build ships with, so that even the sea shall be a 

 highway. Not that any single kind is of utility so 

 multiform. Fruits are supplied by some, as the olive 

 and the fig, the cocoa-nut and the date ; the delicate 

 inner bark of the paper-mulberry furnishes the inhabi- 

 tants of the South Sea Islands with materials for their 



