PEPACTON 



known author that also has the right flavor. I recall 



but one stanza: 



"Oft have I walked these woodland ways, 

 Without the blest foreknowing, 

 That underneath the withered leaves 

 The fairest flowers were blowing." 



Nature's strong and striking effects are best rer> 

 tiered by closest fidelity to her. Listen and look 

 intently, and catch the exact effect as nearly as 

 you can. It seems as if Lowell had done this more 

 than most of his brother poets. In reading his 

 poems, one wishes for a little more of the poetic 

 unction (I refer, of course, to his serious poems; 

 his humorous ones are just what they should be), 

 yet the student of nature will find many close-fit- 

 ting phrases and keen observations in his pages, 

 and lines that are exactly, and at the same time 

 poetically, descriptive. He is the only writer I 

 know of who has noticed the fact that the roots of 

 trees do not look supple and muscular like their 

 boughs, but have a stiffened, congealed look, as of 

 a liquid hardened. 



"Their roots, like molten metal cooled in flowing, 

 Stiffened in coils and runnels down the bank." 



This is exactly the appearance the roots of most 

 trees, when uncovered, present; they flow out from 

 the trunk like diminishing streams of liquid metal, 

 taking the form of whatever they come in contact 

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