258 WASTE-LAND WANDERINGS. 



Our author's fears that general deforesting of the 

 country would prove disastrous were better founded ; 

 yet we have not wholly come to grief. Let one climb 

 to the top of a tall tree and look over the most open 

 countr}" — he will often have to look sharply to see the 

 fields, farm-houses, and even villages, so hidden are they 

 by the abundance of trees. Scattered along the road- 

 side and by the cross fences, they are ignored by the 

 pedestrian, unless he seeks their shade ; but when seen 

 from an elevation, these comparatively few trees about 

 our farmxS aggregate many thousands, and we realize 

 that while there are next to no forests left, we yet are 

 preserved from the dreariness of a desert. 



And now, having generalized to the degree of te- 

 diousness, vv^hat of some old worm-fence particularized ? 



Partly because the ground is rather unproductive, 

 and more because there is a superabundance of it, one 

 such fence within the range of my wanderings has 

 been left undisturbed for more than half a century. To 

 cross it, except at the bars, which are themselves not 

 always free from weeds, is absolutely impossible. The 

 impenetrable tangle of vines in this case extends fully 

 half a rod on either side, and up through it tower trees 

 that are models — tall, shapely, and so widely scattered 

 that never a twig has suffered for want of room. 



I clambered over the splintery, half-decayed bars of 

 this old fence on my way to the creek to-day, i3uri3osely 

 taking a new and circuitous route, because of an early 

 start. I crossed over carefully, and let me add paren- 

 thetically, that I am tempted to assert that misfortune 

 awaits me whenever I quit the firm earth. It is, of 



