XXIV. THE PASSING OF THE TREES 
“My heart ts awed within me when I think 
Of the great miracle that still goes on, 
In silence, round me—the perpetual work 
Of the creation, finished, yet renewed 
Forever. Written on thy works I read 
The lesson of thy own eternity. 
Lol all grow old and die—but see, again, 
How on the faltering footsteps of decay 
Youth presses—ever gay and beautiful youth 
In all its beautiful forms. These lofty trees 
Wave not less proudly that their ancestors 
Moulder beneath them. Oh, there is not lost 
One of earth's charms: upon her bosom yet, 
After the flight of untold centuries, 
The freshness of her far beginning lies 
And yet shall lve.” 
—Bryant (Forest Hymn) 
What becomes of the giants of the forest when they fall? 
A wise man of old said, ‘‘In the place where the tree falleth 
there shall it lie.” Yes, if it escape the woodcutter, it lies 
there; but it does not lie very long. The great oak that 
crashes to earth, crushing everything in its path, lies but one 
growing season ere the underlings are green above it: afew 
years more, and they are crowding into the upper light that it 
once monopolized. Its building up was long—centuries long; 
but a decade is ample for its decay. And well it is for the 
living that the dead do not longer encumber the ground, or 
hold locked up in their stark bodies the materials needed for 
the growth of a new generation. 
Nature makes of the dissolution of these imponderable 
trunks a lightsome task. She proceeds, as ever, without 
haste or noise, making use of frost and sun and rain and a long 
succession of living agents. From the first souring of the sap 
to the final mixing of the log-dust with the soil, she uses bac- 
teria, molds and fungi; and of the higher fungi, an interest- 
ing succession of forms appears as the dissolution of the wood 
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