GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH THE TREES 



above in the great tree, where it may mingle 

 with the warm air of June, already bearing a 

 hundred sweet scents. 



There stands bright in my remembrance 

 one golden June day when I came through a 

 gateway into a wonderful American garden 

 of purely native plants maintained near Phila- 

 delphia, the rock- bound drive guarded by two 

 clumps of tall chestnuts, one on either side, 

 and both in full glory of bloom. There could 

 not have been a more beautiful, natural, or 

 dignified entrance ; and it was just as beautiful 

 in the early fall, when the deep green of the 

 oblong- toothed leaves had changed to clear 

 and glowing yellow, while the flowers had left 

 their perfect work in the swelling and prickly 

 green burs which hid nuts of a brown as 

 rich as the flesh was sweet. 



Did you, gentle reader, ever saunter through 

 a chestnut grove in the later fall, when the 

 yellow had been browned by the frosts which 

 brought to the ground alike leaves and remain- 

 ing burs? There is something especially pleas- 

 ant in the warmth of color and the crackle of 

 sound on the forest floor, as one really shuffles 



1 68 



