216 
land upon their entry thereto, a race of tree worshippers, and the 
cutting down of the groves was a part of their work of destruc- 
tion of the Hamitic idolatry, coérdinate with the overturning of 
idols of wood, brass, and iron, and the destruction of heathen 
altars. Among the Mongolian races certain trees are held sacred 
and certain species whose allies have long since become extinct 
have been preserved to us in China and Japan by being planted 
and cared for about the temples. Even among the Celtic races 
the same conditions have prevailed to a certain extent. The 
Druids held the oak as a sacred tree and the practice was trans- 
not passed from the tree to the locality. It is perhaps not strange 
that the majesty of some of the grand old trees, more impressive 
than the aisles of the grandest cathedral man has formed, should 
lead men to cultivate the religious sentiment, for man’s 
—* simple heart 
Might not resist the sacred influences 
His spirit with the iouedt of boundless power 
And inaccessible majesty.’ 
In more tropical lands, too, as the early inhabitants of America 
carried the elements of civilization across the Pacific, they carried 
with them the trees that were to them the most useful, and to- 
day there is not a tropic isle in either hemisphere that is not girdled 
with a fringe of cocoanut palms, and on every sea-girt islet it is 
true for the native inhabitant that — 
‘*To him the palm is a gift divine, 
Wherein all uses of man combine — 
ouse and raiment and food and wine!”’ 
Besides the cocoanut palm other species stand in the same 
relation to island inhabitants. The date palm of the desert forms 
