FOREST SCENERY. 131 



Of all these phases, the one that is presented to the 

 eye in the month of May is by far the most delightful, 

 on account of the infinite variety of tints and shades 

 in the budding and expanding leaves and blossoms, and 

 the poetic relations of their appearance at this time to 

 one of the most agreeable sentiments of the human 

 soul. I allude to the idea of progression combined 

 with the image of hope and activity. Nothing adds so 

 greatly to the charms of a scene in nature, as any thing 

 which is palpably suggestive of some pleasing moral 

 sentiment. It is this quality that gives half their beauty 

 to certain flowers ; and the unfolding leaves and ripen- 

 ing hues of vegetation require no forced effort of in- 

 genuity, to make apparent their analogy to the period 

 of youth, and the season of hope ; neither are the fad- 

 ing tints of autumn any less suggestive of life's decline. 

 There are not many, however, who would not prefer 

 the lightness of heart that is produced by these emblems 

 of progression, and these signals of the reviving year, 

 to the more poetic sentiment of melancholy, inspired 

 by the scenes of autumn. 



Among the different species of trees and shrubs, there 

 is a notable difference in their habits of leafing and 

 flowering ; some wreathing their flowers upon the naked 

 branches, before the expansion of the leaves, like the 

 peach-tree, the elm, and the maple ; others putting forth 

 their leaves and flowers simultaneously, like the apple- 

 tree and the cherry; others acquiring their full green 

 vesture, before the appearance of their flowers, as the 

 lilac, the elder, the rose, and the viburnum. When we 

 observe these multiplied and beautiful arrangements, we 

 cannot avoid associating them with the benevolence of 

 nature ; and we are prone to regard her as an affec- 

 tionate parent who has instituted these phenomena, in 



