THE ASH-TREE. 



163 



no answer. It was but a small part of the Divine 

 munificence to provide for the satisfaction of bodily 

 wants. It has pleased God to make innumerably 

 more things fitted to do good to our souls than He 

 has prepared of a kind suited to the body, only we 

 think so little of it and so seldom. See how earnestly 

 we thank Him at meal-times, and rightly so, for our 

 meat, and peas, and beans, for our milk and sugar 

 and bread : do we not sometimes err in forgetting to 



ASH LEAVES AND VERY YOUNG FRUIT. 



thank Him for the Trees ? I see, too, in these 

 beautiful pendulous ones, the weeping-ash for ex- 

 ample so charming an ornament for a lawn, espe- 

 cially when not far from a silver birch a sweet 

 emblem of filial love. For though fed and allured in 

 every possible way by the atmosphere and the sun- 

 shine overhead, see how the branches seem to love 

 the spot from which that glorious canopy of verdure 



M 2 



