IN THE WHITE WOODS 



another, its fellow in exact reproduction 

 of line and curve, only swollen to forty 

 times the size. This enormity of limb 

 and twig shut off all vistas. Where it 

 had been easy to see through the bare 

 wood, the brush merely latticing your 

 view and softening up the middle dis- 

 tance with gray or pink or brown, ac- 

 cording to the growth, now the gaze was 

 tangled in a narrow grotto heavily deco- 

 rated with buttress and baluster, with 

 fluting, frieze, and fillet, with mantel, 

 moulding, mullion, and machicolation, 

 and beat in vain against a solid wall of 

 alabaster just beyond. The greater 

 pines were pointed cones of white, each 

 limb drooping with the weight of snow 

 to its fellow below, and the hangings of 

 the outer tips joining to form a surface 

 wherein miniature domes, set strangely 

 askew, yet massed in curves of superb 



