THE HAMILTON ASSOCIATION. 89 



north-east, if you tap the same on the south-west side, comparatively 

 little sap will be obtained. Or if the tree leans towards any other 

 point of the compass the same rule is to be observed, the fluid cur- 

 rents are most copious where the deposition of woody fibre is most 

 needed for the preservation of the structure. Some aver that mere 

 gravitation sufficiently accounts for the fact, but the true cause 

 seems somewhat obscure, as well as those causes that concur to 

 influence the activity of the sap currents in certain meteorological 

 conditions. 



The peculiar sleety storms that sometimes occur in midwinter 

 in these latitudes, and that clothe everything out of doors in a thick 

 coating of ice, frequently prune and mutilate the forest trees with 

 great severity, and large trees occasionally become bent, and their 

 large branches wrenched out of symmetry on such emergencies, and 

 the form of their boles so modified that their outlines in anteglacial 

 times are only "things of memory," 



Woodsmen find but httle difficulty in identifying, even at a dis- 

 tance, the various species of deciduous trees, even in winter, by the 

 curves or angles of the smaller branches or sprays. Those of the 

 oak have a sturdy, continually repeated curve, and thickened, pro- 

 nounced bark. Some aver that the angles that are made by the 

 junction of the maple sprays are the same angles that are indicated 

 by the midveins and veinlets of the leaves ; oak spray curvatures 

 answering to the sinuosities on their leaf margins. Maples, how- 

 ever, when planted in open places, generally assume an oval form in 

 the outline of their branches, and exhibit many exuberant and 

 seemingly independent centres of growth, similar to those well 

 rounded, ebullient forms of dense vapor seen in cumuli clouds on a 

 fine summer day. And in very truth, wherever the maple forest 

 abuts the clearings in a straight hne, the bold, heavy, richly rounded 

 curves of the foliage tops seem to find their counterpart only in 

 summer cloudland, or else in memorable paintings one has some- 

 where seen, representing mountain heights, such as the Tyrol, with 

 an infinity of sky for a background. Only a photograph could con. 

 vey an adequate idea of the so-called mental attitude; " JVul/a 

 planta sine anwia" said Aristotle, of the two trees mentioned above. 

 Everyone gave a smiling assent to the idea of two combatants, when 

 drawn to notice the symbol in woody fibre. My two sons chopped 

 down the big oak. It was five feet and more in diameter at the 



