154 



THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 



November, 1913 



world do they have those queer buttresses 

 for?" 



"No one could say exactly only that it's 

 more or less a characteristic of all trees in 

 swampy land. If a tree rinds he has to 

 sway back and forth he will throw out an 

 anchor to steady himself — even elms and 

 maples do that." 



"But the buttresses of the cypress are 

 hollow, aren't they?" 



"Yes, some think it's to give the tree 

 air. I don't know." 



"All of our cypresses are growing. We've 

 not lost one. And aren't they little beau- 

 ties, with their soft saffron plumes, for 

 autumn has tinted the dainty needles." 



"Yes, and this is another cone-bearing 

 tree that sheds its leaves like the Larch. 

 Deciduous cone-bearers always seem an 

 anomaly to me." 



"Feel of the trunk — the wee bit thing, 

 oh, how lusciously tinted in browns, and 

 reds, and olives. See, it's quite proper and 

 smooth and slim, with no suggestion of the 

 strength and size and weird beauty it is 

 some day to have." 



"Where are they going. Into your 

 garden?" 



"No, no. I'll have no more trees in my 

 garden. There are two pecan trees there 

 that have persistently out-lived all mishaps, 

 and they are on the very border of the 

 garden. We thought so much of the pecans 

 ■ — for they are choice grafted pecans from 

 Georgia — and had such misfortunes with 

 most of the others that we planted out in 

 the fields, that we put these two near the 

 strawberry bed just for a season, to give 

 them a start, and every fall since then I 

 have said to the Master of the House — 

 'Now we just must move those trees, for 

 if we don't in a few years I'll have to give 

 up my strawberries.' Then we'd go to- 



The Scotch pine is a cheery looting tree, not so 

 stiff nor so bristly as the Austrian. Grows a foot 

 or more a year! 



gether to look at the trees, and we'd stand 

 quite still, and we'd not say anything, for 

 we'd be thinking of that long slender tap 

 root that reached down so far in the dark, 

 and how if we broke it another pecan tree 

 would be lost, and then — well, everything 

 about the trees made silent protest and 

 they are still over there. This year there 

 were twelve great fine pecans on one of 

 them — an earnest of its good intentions. 

 Of course that settled it; the strawberry 

 patch must be moved — great white French 

 strawberries at that." 



"Have a care, dear Lady, there's a hole." 



It was quite a sizable hole; World-Man 

 circled around it and walked leisurely on. 

 But I stood there looking at the hole. He 

 turned and seeing me thus absorbed came 

 back. 



"What is it?" 



"Nothing but a hole, that's all; ought to 

 have been filled up long ago." 



"Looks as if something had been in there 

 once. Another tragedy?" 



"Not tragedy exactly — I'd call it, 

 rather — hallucination. I suppose I can 

 tell you, World-Man, for you confided in 

 me about the farm. It's been one of my 

 dreams. The Master of the House is the 

 only one who knows how this hole hurts. 

 But it's not going to hurt longer — no in- 

 deed. I'll make that tree grow yet." 



"I don't see any tree." 



"No, but there was one there — there 

 have been several. Each year since com- 

 ing down here to Hope I've tried it, each 

 year it has gone the way of the others. It 

 was a deodar — a deodar cedar; I've had 

 dreams about the deodar, just as Tartarin 

 had of his little Baobab tree. I could see 

 it reaching away up into the blue sky, tree 

 of the Himalayan snows, to be planted near 

 a Cedar of Lebanon — two Orientals — 

 under which I and mine and all the others 

 who follow might sit and gather that wis- 

 dom long ago given to the wise men who 

 lived with the great cedars of the East. 

 And I thought I should build a little shrine 

 under the branches and in the shrine there 

 should be a book of wisdom, from the Far 

 East, for any one to read in the silence when 

 the wind played on the many stringed harps 

 hymns of holy Lebanon, or minor chords 

 of the far-off Himalayas. If I could only 

 look from my window and see them out 

 there growing, I have so often thought I 

 would be content. But, alas, they have 

 never lived. We've planted them three 

 times and each time they have died, though 

 they were brought from this latitude and 

 climate. I believe it would be better to 

 build the shrine first — perhaps I began 

 wrong end to! I think Tartarin was quite 

 right to plant the Baobab tree in a flower 

 pot. That's what I shall do with my dear 

 cedars of the Orient, and I'll keep the pots in 

 my window; perhaps after the shrine out 

 there is waiting they may stay here with us. 

 But after all, Orientals are strange folk 

 and scarcely understandable." 



"I'll think up a toast for dinner to-night 

 to the health of the next deodar. I wouldn't 

 know it any more than I do the Baobab 



The native white pine as it gets older develops a 

 stratified form of growth recalling the Cedar of 

 Lebanon. 



tree, but if it brings wisdom I'd like one 

 too for my farm. What more worlds are 

 you longing to conquer? Haven't you any 

 nice, everyday, common trees? I want a 

 piece of bread and butter. These deodars 

 and Chatmzcyparis Lawsoniana would never 

 agree with my digestion." 



"Don't you know those trees lined up 

 against the fence? " 



"Junipers? I'll make a wild guess; called 

 red cedars down here, perhaps? " 



"You guessed right, only that's not my 

 name for them. I call them Grace O'God." 



" Grace O'God?" 



"Yes, oh, how they grow! Why, see 

 they are much taller than I am, and how 

 they bend and sing to themselves. Come 

 closer, now listen. Don't you hear that 

 song? Oh! I knew it. I knew the song 

 was there and everyone laughed when I 

 told Copper to take up all those wee things 

 under the tulip tree. I said, 'Copper, it's 

 just the Grace O'God that gives us those 

 trees. He has blown those seeds there in 

 His great gales, or perhaps the birds in 

 flight have winged them to the grass under 

 the tulip tree and they have hugged the 

 earth with their wee arms and the earth 

 has made them warm and has fed them, 

 and now they are living, breathing wind 

 harps. We'll keep them all, Copper, all 

 we can.' Why, some of them were only 

 three inches high, only such a little while 

 ago, and now, why, they're trees — trees 

 to rest the eye with their soft colors, to cast 

 long narrow shadows when the sun burns 

 hot, to sing that music which only the 

 soul can hear." 



"And you and old Isaac Copper did all 

 this?" 



"Oh no — we did so little. You can't 

 dream how little we did — we just took 

 them up and planted them out in the sun- 

 light. And the rest — why, that was just 

 the Grace o' God." 



