LRAPLESS WOODS. 15 



Spring and summer, as we have said, 

 manufacture; but it is Winter tliat discloses 

 tlie work, in the deciduous forest. Then, and then 

 only, can we see the entire effect, because the 

 garment of leaves has been thrust aside and 

 Nature holds her exhibition — free to all — of form ; 

 and its finest effect is seen in the forest which 

 has been untouched by the hand of the pruning 

 forester. 



It is this close and intimate view — which the 

 free exhibition of Nature discloses to the interested 

 and delighted student — that opens up the marvel- 

 lous variety conspicuous, not only in the forest as 

 a whole, but in individual trees even of the same 

 kind; Gilpin says, in his description of what he 

 calls the ' picturesque beauty ' of trees, that 

 ' though every animal is distinguished from its 

 fellow by some little variation of colour, character, 

 or shape, yet in all the larger parts, in the body 

 and limbs, the resemblance is generally exact. In 

 trees it is just the reverse ; the smaller parts — 

 the spray, the leaves, the blossom, and the seed — 

 are the same in all trees of the same kind, while 

 the larger parts are wholly different. You seldom 



