272 TREES IN NATURE, MYTH & ART 



whole scene at once. What interests us in the 

 picture is the tangle of wild shrubs, after seeing 

 which we can never again look with indiffer- 

 ence at such a tangle in nature. 



So with the willow-trees in Holman Hunt's 

 "The Hireling Shepherd" and Millais' "Ophe- 

 lia"; so, also, with the Lombardy poplars in 

 Millais' "Autumn Leaves" and "The Vale 

 of Rest," and with the bole of the ancient 

 oak in his "The Proscribed Royalist" — to take 

 only a few examples. If we had never looked 

 closely at the beautiful texture, colour and form 

 of common vegetation, we could hardly fail to 

 do so ever after, if once we had carefully looked 

 at the marvellous painting of detail in such 

 pictures as these. No previous painters had 

 done such work as this. With regard to many 

 of them the doubt would be, as we have already 

 seen, whether we could identify, as being 

 meant for any particular kinds of trees, those 

 that appeared in their pictures. Holman Hunt 

 and Millais, and the imitators of their closely 

 realistic painting, have not only represented 

 trees so that they are at once recognisable by 

 those who are familiar with their general appear- 

 ance, they have quickened our observation and 



