THE TREE FOLK 17 



know, but that is what they did; and the result was the 

 handsomest Elm dome on the South Shore. 



The town fathers saw fit to use the knoll, on which the 

 faithful brothers stood, as a gravel pit, and in course of 

 time they undermined and overthrew the trees, thus 

 bringing to naught the patient work of a hundred years. 

 But that means nothing to a Town Father whose eyes 

 have to be kept at the level of the public highways and 

 the voting list. 



Down on Cape Cod, at Hyannis, there used to be a 

 row of Willow trees as handsome as a house afire. The 

 foliage of these trees was about like smoke in appear- 

 ance (Plate VII). To the eye of the artist that is very 

 handsome indeed. It is as handsome as an ostrich plume, 

 or the cloud from the locomotive of a mile-long freight 

 train. 



What makes it beautiful? That which artists call gra- 

 dation or rhythmic sequence. That plume goes from 

 broad to narrow; from open to solid; from gray to black. 

 Moreover, its general movement follows the line of that 

 curve of force you have heard of before. How different 

 it is from a row of young Maples, D, such as the new 

 Park Commissioner boasts about: ''All alike, the same 

 size, the same distance apart, not a dead one in the lot." 

 That perfect row of A No. i trees is as handsome as the 

 noise a vigorous boy makes with a stick rattling along 

 a perfectly good picket fence. It is Chinese music. 



