creswell] THE AMERICAN ASH ■ 283 



it, hence the most important use for ash in the dairy regions is 

 for butter tubs. Michigan sells her ash in the form of automo- 

 biles; Arkansas for tool-handles; Louisiana for oars; Massa- 

 chusetts in furniture ; the Carolinas in wagons and Texas as boxes 

 and crates. 



The ash is very free from attacks by insect and fungi and bears 

 transplanting well. These qualities with its beautiful foliage that 

 is not so dense as to prevent grass growing under it make it an 

 excellent tree for street or park planting. 



A curious little mite finds its way into the staminate flowers and 

 the flower cluster seems to do its best to care for the tiny parasite, 

 leastwise instead of dropping off when its pollen is discharged as 

 any well-behaved staminate flower should, stays on until the next 

 spring and grows into a mass of brown material resembling a 

 witch's broom. In this the mite resides until the new flower cluster 

 is ready for occupancy. 



Trees have ever had their place in the mythology of man and the 

 ash has had its part. Not much of this came to the practical 

 American but one saying refers to the foretelling of the weather. 



"If the oak is out before the ash, 

 'Twill be a summer of wet and splash; 

 But if the ash is out before the oak, 

 'Twill be a summer of fire and smoke." 



One needs but to go to the records of ancient Scandinavian 

 Europe, the home of vikings and sagas, to find the ash the center 

 of worship as was the oak to the tribes southward. To them all 

 life came from the sacred ash Ygdrasil. It supported the whole 

 universe, one of its huge roots reached to the realm of the gods, 

 another to the realm of wisdom and wit among the giants and the 

 third into the region of darkness where a huge dragon fed constantly 

 upon its roots. These Norsemen, or Vikings are referred to by 

 Bishop Adams of Bremen as Aschmen (ashmen) possibly because 

 as Edda narrates, the first man was fashioned from ash ; or possibly 

 because they carried ashen spears. 



Pliny says a snake would as soon crawl thru fire as thru an ash 

 tree. 



As the myth is replaced by the practical, so grows man's appre- 

 ciation of this tree since it contributes so ably to his ever extending 

 means of production to his comfort by giving him safe vehicles for 

 rapid transportation in canoe, wagon, carriage, automobile or air- 



