14 THE TREE FOLK 



of clothing against the sunrise, to the ample matron who 

 sits as comfortably upon the hillside as a Gypsy, the 

 luxuriant folds of her garments golden with the sunset. 



COLORS, in tree robes, change with age, as I sug- 

 gested a few moments ago. Those changes cannot 

 be illustrated in pencil. You will have to use your own 

 eyes. Make up your mind to concentrate on tree colors 

 for one year out of your three score and ten. You would 

 never regret it. 



You would see the Water Maples, when the Spring 

 awoke them some morning in April and they became 

 conscious of their nudity, blush themselves into a netted 

 robe of coral. You would see the Elms put on their 

 brown old laces, and the Beeches don their spangles of 

 copper. You would see the Sugar Maples in silks of 

 chrysoprase, and the Apple trees in velvets of jade. 



The woodlands in April are more lovely than at any 

 other time of year. All the new robes of the tree folk are 

 of gauze, veiling but not obscuring their exquisite 

 bodies. And the color of that gauze ranges from silver 

 through gold and copper to ruby and emerald. The trees 

 in spring have colors for which there are actually no 

 words in the language and no images in the mind, as 

 Ruskin says, colors which can be appreciated only when 

 present to the eye, and not even then unless you have 

 the soul of an artist. 



