48 A SPRAY OF PINE. 



longest poems, is mainly the notes of the pine. The- 

 odore Parker said that a tree that talked like Em- 

 erson's pine ought to be cut down, but if the pine 

 were to find a tongue I should sooner expect to hear 

 the Emersonian dialect from it than almost any 

 other. It would be pretty high up certainly, and go 

 oyer the heads of most of the other trees. It were 

 sure to be pointed, though the point few could see. 

 And it would not be garrulous and loud mouthed, 

 though it might talk on and on. Whether it would 

 preach or not is a question, but I have no doubt it 

 would be a fragrant healing gospel if it did. I think 

 its sentences would be short ones with long pauses be- 

 tween them, and that they would sprout out of the sub- 

 ject independently and not connect or interlock very 

 much. There would be breaks and chasms or may 

 be some darkness between the lines, but I should ex- 

 pect from it a lofty, cheerful, and all-the-year-round 

 philosophy. The temptation to be oracular would no 

 doubt be great, and could be more readily overlooked 

 in this tree than in any other. Then the pine being 

 the oldest tree, great wisdom and penetration might be 

 expected of it. 



Though Emerson's pine boasts 



" My garden is the cloven rock, 

 And my manure the snow; 

 And drifting sand heaps feed my stock, 

 In summer's scorching glow," 



yet the great white pine loves a strong deep soil. 

 How it throve along our river bottom and pointed 



