208 HARMONIES OF THE TEMPERATE ZONE. 
Indestructible vigour of the climates of the West? Why doth this 
oak live through a thousand years? Because it is ever young. 
It is the oak which chronicles the commencement of spring. For 
us the emotion of the new life does not begin when all nature clothes 
itself in the uniform verdure of the meaner vegetation. It commences 
only when we see the oak, from the woody foliage of the past, which it 
still retains, gathering its fresh leaves ; when the elm, permitting itself 
to be outstripped by inferior trees, tints with a light green the severe 
delicacy of its airy branches, clearly defined against the sky. 
Then, then, Nature speaks to all—her potent voice troubles even 
the soul of sages. And why not? Is she not holy? And this sur- 
prising awakening, which has stirred life everywhere —from the hard 
dumb heart of the oaks, even to their lofty crest, where the bird pours 
out its gladness—is it not, as it were, a return of God? 
