SPANISH CHESTNUT. 201 



peace, shaded by nought of evil, and unchequered by the 

 viscissitudes of time, is thus perpetually renewed, and 

 around me have spread branches in wild and joyous pro- 

 fusion. But a change is passing over me, and my day's 

 work is nearly done ; yet I am not solitary in my old age : 

 my venerable roots are nearly hidden by a glad progeny of 

 bright green mosses, birds still build their nests among my 

 branches, and I hear the glad voices of such as recall to 

 my remembrance the warbling chorus that used to re- 

 sound from the midst of my widely spreading foliage in the 

 days of Egbert. 



Would you contemplate the height, and breadth, and 

 magnificent proportions of our tribe, visit the wildest 

 portions of the Apennines, and roam among their rocks 

 and dingles, beneath the shade of innumerable chestnuts, 

 through forests, such as your fatherland may not boast, 

 now rapidly ascending almost perpendicular heights, which 

 the most reckless traveller night scruple to attempt, and 

 now pressing on through a vast brotherhood of enormous 



