198 My Neighbor's Wood-Shed 



and sassafras chips of the trees that came 

 from the meadows where, in April, the 

 spring arrivals of our many birds are sure to 

 congregate. 



Somehow I never think of the really sad 

 facl: that this shed is the forest's charnel- 

 house, and a fit place wherein to drop more 

 honest tears than fall at most funerals. Is it 

 because my neighbor is felling his forest and 

 not mine ? Probably ; and, as we all know, 

 Death's ravages among our neighbors excite 

 our curiosity more than our grief. We are 

 more apt to be inquisitive as to the details 

 of the physical collapse than of the spiritual, 

 but I am no preacher. 



How easy to build a tree from but a single 

 chip ! to see the round of the seasons at a 

 single glance when the restored tree stands 

 out before us ! Even the lid of my old desk 

 that was split, sawed, smoothed, and shaped 

 just one hundred and thirty-seven years ago 

 quits the corner of my little room and be- 

 comes again a stately walnut, on the bluff of 

 old Crosswicks, the instant that I will it ! 

 And what tales of wild adventure in colonial 

 days float vaguely in the mists of day-dreams 

 such as this ? The paw of a puma may have 



