162 



Forests and Trees 



FIG. 27. Aspen. 



spaced branches, and thin, smooth, yellowish-green or whitish 

 bark, the outer surface of which rubs off as a white dust. At 

 the base of old trees the bark may be- 

 come thick, rough and almost black. 

 The leaves are orbicular, finely toothed, 

 a light green when young, but becoming 

 darker with age. The petioles are long, 

 slender and flattened, so that the leaf 

 trembles very easily in the slightest 

 breeze. This is why it has a reputa- 

 tion for having leaves that are never 

 at rest. The trembling leaf of the aspen 

 has been mentioned frequently in poetry, 

 and given rise to many myths and super- 

 stitions. Scott refers to it when describing the march of the 

 Earl of Marr's army just before the battle at the mouth of the 

 Trossachs. 



"There breathed no wind their crests to shake, 

 Nor wave their flags abroad ; 

 Scarce the frail aspen seem'd to quake, 

 That shadow'd o'er their road." 



The French Canadian lumbermen have a superstition that 

 poplar was the wood out of which the cross was made upon 

 which Christ was crucified. For that reason the tree was 

 condemned never to be at rest and the leaves could always be 

 seen to tremble. The wood was regarded as bringing bad luck, 

 and many men would refuse to trust their lives to a crib if any 

 poplar had been used in its construction. The poplar of this 

 superstition was, of course, the aspen. 



Of the different races of trees which succeed each other in 

 the changing life of a forest, the aspen is among the first. Owing 

 to its method of spreading seeds and its rapid growth, it gets 

 possession of all waste places before any other tree. It forms 



