THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH. 73 



" Through primrose turfs, in that sweet bower, 



The periwinkle trail'd its wreaths ; 

 And 'tis my faith that every flower 

 Enjoys the air it breathes. 



The budding twigs spread out their fan, 



To catch the breezy air ; 

 And I must think, do all I can, 



That there was pleasure there." 



If anything of this kind exists, how great and grave 

 must be the sentient feeling of the mighty pines and 

 cedars of the Himaliya ! There is a considerable 

 variety of them, as the Pinus excelsa, or the " weep- 

 ing fir," which, though beautiful, is hardly deserving 

 of its aspiring name ; the Pinus longifolia, or Cheel 

 tree, the most abundant of all ; the Pinus Khutrow, 

 or Picea Morinda, which almost rivals the deodars in 

 height ; and the Pinus Morinda, or Abies Pindrow, 

 the " silver fir," which attains the greatest height of 

 all But, excelling all these, is the Cedrus deodara, 

 the Deodar or Kedron tree. There was something 

 very grand about these cedars of the Sutlej valley, 

 sometimes forty feet in circumference, and rising 

 almost to two hundred feet, or half the height of St 

 Paul's, on nearly precipitous slopes, and on the scan- 

 tiest soil, yet losing no line of beauty in their stems 

 and their graceful pendant branches, and with their 

 tapering stems and green arrowy spikes covered by a 

 clinging trellis-work of Virginia creepers and clematis 

 still in white bloom. These silent giants of a world 



