12 MY DEVON YEAR 



spring at angles mostly acute in relation to the main 

 stem or branch ; while the lower, pendulous branches 

 often fall with droop as delicate and perfect as those 

 of the beech or weeping willow. Like the Druid 

 oaks, the ash enjoyed high vogue for a tree of power 

 and mystery. In the Norse mythology Yggdrasil was 

 the ash tree of the Universe, whose roots ran in three 

 directions — to the Asa-gods in heaven, to the Frost- 

 giants, and to the under world. Odin made the first 

 man from ash, while the first woman he manufactured 

 of elm. Ask and Embla are the Scandinavian Adam 

 and Eve. Aforetime much agricultural importance 

 attached to the earliest energies of ash and oak, 

 and a tradition, still accounted sound in conservative 

 minds, declares that if the oak gets into leaf before 

 his neighbour a fat year may be prophesied, while 

 should the ash be first to shake out his pinnate leaves, 

 then will follow a cold Summer and sterile Autumn. 

 Now, in January, the wolf-month, both trees sleep 

 soundly, and the fate of July and August lies hid in 

 budlets that are transparent sepia or brown on the 

 oak, but black and oval upon his neighbour's up- 

 turned twig-ends. 



The horse-chestnut is another tree built on lines of 

 utmost simplicity and severity. The scaffold for his 

 noble foliage and pyramids of blossom — those fair 

 flowers that glimmer like lighted tapers out of the 

 ebony and silver of moony nights — is simple yet of 

 perfect adaptation to subsequent foliage and massive 

 fruit. A candelabra-like skeleton is that of the horse- 



