255 



CHAPTEE XY. 



SALICACE^ BETULACE^ MYEICACE^ 

 COEYLlCE M- CONIFEK M TAXlCE^E. 



" The Oak tree and the Mountain Pine, 

 The Willow on the fountain's brim, 

 The Birch tree and the Eglantine, 



In reverence bend to Hun ; 

 The song-birds pour their sweetest lays 



From tower, and tree, and middle air; 

 The rushing river murmurs praise 

 All nature worships there ! " 



DAVID VEDDEK. 



FEOM tlie time when Adam " heard the voice of the Lord 

 among the trees of the garden" to the present day, these lords 

 of the vegetable creation have borne a marked part in the 

 history of man. When Israel was oppressed by enemies, and 

 Gideon threshed his Wheat in secret, an angel of the Lord 

 came and " sat under the Oak tree that was in Ophrah," 

 promising aid and deliverance. Elijah, exhausted in body and 

 mind in the great conflict with idolatry, slept a miraculous 

 sleep, and was miraculously fed under a Juniper tree. Trees 

 were used in building from the earliest period, and they entered 

 largely into the formation of the Tabernacle and the Temple. 

 And, as evil is ever striving to overgrow the good, so the 

 Creator's gift of trees was perverted to the use of idolatry. 

 " He heweth him down Cedars, and taketh the Cypress and the 

 Oak." " He kindleth it and baketh bread ; yea, he maketh a 

 god and worshippeth it. He burneth part thereof in the fire ; 

 with part thereof he eateth flesh, and the residue thereof he 

 maketh a god." Idol-altars were raised beneath the covert of 

 the grove. " Inflaming yourselves with idols under every green 

 tree." " And they set them up images upon every high hill, 



