Woodpaths. 1 1 



then under solemn pines, opening into a grander solitude, where dwells 

 perpetual twilight, — halls familiar with darkness at noonday, and visited 

 only by the beams of the morning and evening sun. 



Everywhere there is a store of essences on the dewy air, — sometimes a 

 scent of pines, such as a mild south wind at twilight will waft into your 

 window from a neighboring grove ; then the perfume of oaks, less sweet 

 and aromatic, but like that which we may suppose to have surrounded the 

 Oracle of Dodona. Now a mild breeze will waft us the scent of strawberry- 

 beds, bearing a message to the bee to tell where the flowers have spread 

 their feast of nectar. At every season, the air about this path is full of 

 sweet odors, that would communicate to our senses the contiguity of certain 

 plants. Not a flower appears that does not give some balmy notice of its 

 presence ; not a zephyr wanders through this avenue but with wings laden 

 as if it had passed over the plains of Araby. 



While rambling in one of these paths, where the ruts of the wagoner's 

 wheels are hardly perceptible along the green turf, I am affected by a glow 

 of pleasure that cannot be felt in a nicely-gravelled walk through the 

 grounds of a palace. I feel a sense of quiet and poetic seclusion here, 

 that would dissolve, as by a spell, at the least appearance of ornamental 

 design. It is difficult to explain the philosophy of this sentiment. But 

 Nature, whose works perfectly harmonize with the rustic woodpath and the 

 artless operations of rustic toil, refuses her blessing to the nicely-trimmed 

 avenue and to the ambitious designs of wealth. In a gravelled walk 

 through a lordly estate, there is neither seclusion nor repose ; in the path- 

 less wood, seclusion becomes painful solitude: but in the unadorned wood- 

 path is sweet retirement, where the rude work of pastoral hands is such as 

 to render the solitude still more charming. 



Though the woodpath does not glow with the splendor and abundance 

 of a parterre, there is a never-ending variet}' of objects to enliven the 

 senses and the imagination. Here are sweet violets dotting the green- 

 sward with heaven's owm azure ; roses that breathe into the atmosphere 

 the very aroma of purity ; vines that throw their drapery over the branches 

 that form our canopy, making the air ambrosial with their fragrant blos- 

 soms in summer, and tempting our sight with their purple clusters in au- 

 tumn. Here are mossy couches so soft, so beautiful, so hallowed, that the 



