STUDIES OF TREES IN WINTER 



growth of little twigs along the trunk and 

 branches. They may feather any of the differ- 

 ent forms already described, and they come from 

 latent buds which may have been dormant for 

 years before opening. 



" The white elm," Professor Charles S. Sar- 

 gent says, " is one of the largest and most 

 graceful trees of the Northeastern States and 

 Canada. It is beautiful at all seasons of the 

 year, when its minute flowers, harbingers of 

 earliest spring, cover the branches ; when in 

 summer it rises like a great fountain of dark 

 and brilliant green above its humbler com- 

 panions of the forest or sweeps with long and 

 graceful boughs the placid waters of some 

 stream flowing through verdant meadows ; 

 when autumn delicately tints its leaves; and 

 when winter brings out every detail of the 

 great arching limbs and slender pendulous 

 branches standing out in clear relief against 

 the sky. 



" The elm trees which greeted the English 

 colonists as they landed on the shores of New 

 England seemed like old friends from their 

 general resemblance to the elm trees that had 

 stood by their cottages at home; and as the 

 forest gave way to cornfields many elm trees 

 were allowed to escape the axe, and when a 



104 



