ON THE MANUSCRIPTS OF GOD 



"oldest families," like the baobabs, the yews, 

 oaks (whom Keats called "those green-robed 

 senators"), limes, cedars, Oriental planes, 

 the sequoias, and Indian fig, or banyan, 

 whose bending twigs take root until it builds 

 itself 



"Into a sylvan temple arched aloof 

 With airy aisles and living colonnades." 



One of these Indian figs, the Cubeer Burr, 

 on an island in the river Nerbudda will ac- 

 commodate in its shade seven thousand peo- 

 ple, and feed them with its small scarlet figs, 

 and furnish bird-music from a thousand 

 warblers in its branches. 



Another distinguished representative of 

 the first families is the maiden-hair tree, or 

 Girikgo biloba, which traces its ancestry to 

 the primary rocks, and boasts of ancestors 

 which played highly important roles in 

 Mesozoic times. 



Corresponding also to our aristocracy of 

 brains is the sylvan aristocracy of grains. 

 For, like men, trees may be grouped accord- 

 ing to outward and visible signs or by their 



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