AN OLIVE GROVE 103 



unending hammer strokes of a man break- 

 ing stone somewhere in the road below — 

 do all this, and you can begin to realize 

 what my old olive grove is in fact and in 

 sentiment. 



Bordighera is half framed by hills, and 

 on every one of these hills there is an olive 

 grove; but this one grove (I call it the 

 "Saracen Grove") is the most attractive. 

 In several ways it can be reached, but 

 usually I prefer a path which passes 

 through a fringe of pine trees, fully as 

 aromatic as are our balsam firs in the 

 White Mountains. The largest of these 

 pines is the stone pine (pinus pinea), but 

 popularly named the "umbrella pine," 

 because, as a certain humorist said, "It 

 looks as much like an umbrella opened as 

 the cypress looks like an umbrella closed." 

 Without doubt it is this stone pine to 

 which Wordsworth refers in the Italian 

 sonnet, where he describes the tree in one 

 poetic, etching stroke as — "like a cloud — 

 a slender stem the tie that bound it to 



