ENGLISH WOODS: A CONTRAST. 47 



but fifty acres, may afford to give more wood for fire, 

 as good as the world yields, than many noblemen in 

 England." In many parts of New England, New 

 York, and Pennsylvania, the same royal fires may 

 still be indulged in. In the chief nature-poet of Eng- 

 land, Wordsworth, there is no line that has the subtle 

 aroma of the deep woods. After seeing his country, 

 one can recognize its features, its spirit, all through 

 his poems its impressive solitudes, its lonely tarns, 

 its silent fells, its green dales, its voiceful waterfalls ; 

 but there are no woods there to speak of ; the moun- 

 tains appear to have always been treeless, and the 

 poet's muse has never felt the spell of this phase of 

 nature the mystery and attraction of the in-doors 

 of aboriginal wildness. Likewise in Tennyson there 

 is the breath of the wold, but not of the woods. 



Among our own poets, two at least of the more 

 eminent have listened to the siren of our primitive 

 woods. I refer to Bryant and Emerson. Though 

 so different, there is an Indian's love of forests and 

 forest-solitudes in them both. Neither Bryant's " For- 

 est Hymn " nor Emerson's " Woodnotes " could have 

 been written by an English poet. The " Woodnotes " 

 savor of our vast Northern pine forests, amid which 

 one walks with distended pupil, and a boding, alert 

 sense. 



"In unploughed Maine he sought the lumberers' gang, 

 Where from a hundred lakes young rivers sprang ; 

 He trode the unplanted forest floor, whereon 

 The all-seeing sun for ages hath not shone ; 



