288 A WHITE-PAPER GARDEN 



sense, the credo of the tree planter includes 

 much of the highest religion. 



It is only when trees are bare that we can 

 see how beautiful are these types of man, 

 when stripped of the garments by which so 

 many of their most distinctive characteristics 

 are hidden. Were the leaves always here, 

 we should know little of the structure of the 

 trees themselves, and our acquaintance with 

 them would be exactly as accurate as if we 

 recognised our closest friends by certain of 

 their coats or ribbons, and did not know them 

 if they changed their fashion. Half of the 

 beauty of the beech is gone when we cannot 

 see the lichens painted on her grey bole, or 

 the network of her delicate branchings. The 

 rugged corrugations of the sassafras - trunks 

 tell quite a different story from that of their 

 leaves and fruits, and are wholly unlike the 

 grey flakes which cover the hickories, and 

 the rough sheathings .of the oaks and walnuts. 

 The shredded purple integuments of the wild 

 cherries are not at all to be confounded with 

 the uninteresting garb of maples, and lindens 

 and ashes, and the sycamores have a world-old 

 tale printed in their pale faces. One lady 



