TREES GROWING IN RICH SOIL. 



189 



the priests in the temples interpreted the responses that were 

 conveyed to them by the motion of the trees in the wind. 

 The lover in Tennyson's English Idyll, " The Talking Oak," 

 exclaims in gratitude for the knowledge it has told him of 

 his sweetheart Olivia and in reference to the ancient oracle : — 



*' And I will work in prose and rhyme, 



And praise tliue more in both 

 Than hard lias liononr'tl hcech or lime, 



Or that Thessalian growth, 

 In which the swarthy ring dove sat, 



And mystic sentence spoke; 

 And more than luigland honours that, 



Thy famous brother oak, 

 Wherein the yonnger Charles abode 



Till all the paths were dim, 

 And far below the Roundhead rode. 



And humm'd a surly hymn." 



Hercules we must also remember carried an oaken club. 

 Of the gc'iuis, (^uerctis alba is one of the most stately. It 

 seems odd, in earliest spring to see the great, grey thing 

 putting forth leaves as tender tinted and i)ink as many a shy, 

 woodland flower. In their second childhood, — that is, in the 

 late autumn, — the leaves again become a ruddy hue, deep and 

 vinous ; and after withering, drop from the trees at the be- 

 ginning of winter. Throughout their course of existence they 

 are very variable on different trees, and often two or three 

 distinct forms are presented. 



The white oak is one of the very valual)le timber trees of 

 North America and is imported as staves in large quantities 

 to Europe. In ship-building and in the manufacturing of car- 

 riages it has an important place. 



