POPLAR AND WILLOW 



"willow-pattern" crockery and porcelain is per- 

 petuated the legend of the Chinese maiden Koong 

 Shee who loved her father's secretary, Chang, and ran 

 away with him. A similar legend is current in old 

 Korean literature. In our own folk-lore and songs 

 the Willow is associated with love, unrequited or 

 forbidden. The note of sadness is present and the 

 bond of sympathy is ever to the fore. Someone has 

 asserted that the beautiful always awakens sadness, 

 and perhaps this explains why the Willow and grief 

 are inseparably linked in the poetry and prose of 

 many lands. 



The Poplar, on the other hand, inspires no such 

 thoughts. Each and every one of its branches grow 

 erect and cluster closely together as if afraid to 

 leave the bosom of the parent trunk. Rapidly it 

 grows and thrusts its narrow, spire-like crown heaven- 

 ward. Like ambition its one desire seems to be 

 to excel its fellows and flaunt in the breeze far above 

 their heads. Trees from loo to 150 feet tall are 

 known — gaunt in winter but spires of green in sum- 

 mer, like sentinels they stand and dare both the laws 

 of gravity and the fury of storms. For their great 

 daring they often suffer, but so do others of greater 

 timidity. To watch a Lombardy Poplar in a wind- 

 storm is inspiring. No tree puts up a better struggle. 

 It bows far over and defiantly regains its equilibrium 



229 



